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You can immediately start working on your wiki or whenever you want. * * [[Blender Basics]] * [[FFXIV Blender Setup]] * [[BG3 Blender Setup]] * [[Photography Techniques]] * [[Adobe Photoshop]] * [[Adobe Premirere]] * [[Category: Game Characters]] * df075f9c83cd7d2e318148b5ff20931b76550b78 24 6 2024-02-24T01:39:29Z Kuwelsco 2 wikitext text/x-wiki __NOTOC__ == Welcome to {{SITENAME}}! == This is where I keep all my Visual Arts Notes * [[Blender Basics]] * [[FFXIV Blender Setup]] * [[BG3 Blender Setup]] * [[Photography Techniques]] * [[Adobe Photoshop]] * [[Adobe Premiere]] * [[Category: Game Characters]] * 0b7e616ae1e9faf29a058cf66d939e3500b71c69 25 24 2024-02-24T01:43:43Z Kuwelsco 2 /* Welcome to {{SITENAME}}! */ wikitext text/x-wiki __NOTOC__ == Welcome to {{SITENAME}}! == This is where I keep all my Visual Arts Notes * [[Blender Basics]] * [[FFXIV Blender Setup]] * [[BG3 Blender Setup]] * [[Photography Techniques]] * [[Adobe Photoshop]] * [[Adobe Premiere]] *[[Audio Tools Guides]] *[[Video Editing Guides]] * [[Category: Game Characters]] * c0816d3c76fecf5dbb18229e38610602f0c90099 FFXIV Blender Setup 0 2 5 2024-02-24T00:18:02Z Kuwelsco 2 Created page with "Blender FF14 Textools Mektools FF14ModArchive" wikitext text/x-wiki Blender FF14 Textools Mektools FF14ModArchive 1ef0c8cd5e46c51fd6e1dd97c19635bd36b2133c BG3 Blender Setup 0 3 7 2024-02-24T00:43:53Z Kuwelsco 2 Created page with "Please take a look [[HOLYFARTS BG3 Blender Guide]]" wikitext text/x-wiki Please take a look [[HOLYFARTS BG3 Blender Guide]] 9c00664753e05a5cfe161a4053080597ca54007a HOLYFARTS BG3 Blender Guide 0 4 8 2024-02-24T00:44:02Z Kuwelsco 2 Created page with "<!----- You have some errors, warnings, or alerts. If you are using reckless mode, turn it off to see inline alerts. * ERRORs: 0 * WARNINGs: 0 * ALERTS: 9 Conversion time: 4.072 seconds. Using this Markdown file: 1. Paste this output into your source file. 2. See the notes and action items below regarding this conversion run. 3. Check the rendered output (headings, lists, code blocks, tables) for proper formatting and use a linkchecker before you publish this pag..." wikitext text/x-wiki <!----- You have some errors, warnings, or alerts. If you are using reckless mode, turn it off to see inline alerts. * ERRORs: 0 * WARNINGs: 0 * ALERTS: 9 Conversion time: 4.072 seconds. Using this Markdown file: 1. Paste this output into your source file. 2. See the notes and action items below regarding this conversion run. 3. Check the rendered output (headings, lists, code blocks, tables) for proper formatting and use a linkchecker before you publish this page. Conversion notes: * Docs to Markdown version 1.0β35 * Fri Feb 23 2024 16:42:36 GMT-0800 (PST) * Source doc: Blender Crash Course - BG3 Edition * This document has images: check for >>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link in generated source and store images to your server. NOTE: Images in exported zip file from Google Docs may not appear in the same order as they do in your doc. Please check the images! WARNING: You have 6 H1 headings. You may want to use the "H1 -> H2" option to demote all headings by one level. -----> <p style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: ERRORs: 0; WARNINGs: 1; ALERTS: 9.</p> <ul style="color: red; font-weight: bold"><li>See top comment block for details on ERRORs and WARNINGs. <li>In the converted Markdown or HTML, search for inline alerts that start with >>>>> gd2md-html alert: for specific instances that need correction.</ul> <p style="color: red; font-weight: bold">Links to alert messages:</p><a href="#gdcalert1">alert1</a> <a href="#gdcalert2">alert2</a> <a href="#gdcalert3">alert3</a> <a href="#gdcalert4">alert4</a> <a href="#gdcalert5">alert5</a> <a href="#gdcalert6">alert6</a> <a href="#gdcalert7">alert7</a> <a href="#gdcalert8">alert8</a> <a href="#gdcalert9">alert9</a> <p style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> PLEASE check and correct alert issues and delete this message and the inline alerts.<hr></p> Hello! This requires some slight awareness of Blender. - Please Click on the Welcome to begin! [TOC] # Welcome! {#welcome} # Welcome! {#welcome} Basic Navigation - the Sidebar on the Left is the Chapter Outline, the Table of Contents below is the Sections and Lessons I set this layout this way so if you are having problems, you can easily refer to the Lesson Number and provide assistance if needed. 🚨🚨🚨Disclaimer🚨🚨🚨🚨 🚨🚨I’m not a fan of hardcore lewd stuff🚨🚨 Simple way to vibe check, is to use the _“Game of Thrones Test”_ (the TV show not the book! 😂) If anything is more spicy than what was shown on Game of Thrones then all that I ask is to please blur it out before asking for help. Lastly, NO DISSING KOBOLDS 😂or at least just not Popper The Businesslord ## _<span style="text-decoration:underline;">“So whats the goal of this Tutorial ?”</span>_ {#“so-whats-the-goal-of-this-tutorial-”} To help users to be more familiar with Blender and remove the harsh learning curve. I learned Blender from using FFXIV Game Models, So I strongly feel that by using content you are familiar with, that will also give you that extra motivation finishing your goal in learning Blender. This is also a way to further improve my own skills in Blender. To quote [Jim Kwik :](https://www.jimkwik.com/podcasts/kwik-brain-001-learning-anything-faster) * _If you want to cut your learning curve in half, learn with the intention of teaching it to somebody else._ * _If you had to give a presentation on what you’re learning today, you would learn it differently. You would pay closer attention. You would take more detailed notes. You would ask better questions._ * _When you teach something, You get to learn it twice._ ## _<span style="text-decoration:underline;">“Ok. So what will I learn in this tutorial?”</span>_ {#“ok-so-what-will-i-learn-in-this-tutorial-”} Able to use the Nyls Model and any other model from Open3DLab/Smutbase/Etc You would learn to pose your own scene render in Eevee similar to this Popper the Kobold here. <p id="gdcalert1" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image1.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert2">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image1.png "image_tooltip") Example 2 ## _<span style="text-decoration:underline;">“Sold! What Do I need to do?”</span>_ {#“sold-what-do-i-need-to-do-”} # Chapter 1. Getting Started - Intro ## Blender 3.6 LTS {#blender-3-6-lts} **Please use Blender 3.6 LTS** Yes, there is Blender 4 out but 3.6 has the most addon compatibility at the moment. The goal of this tutorial is to simplify the learning curve of making simple animations in Blender using the BG3 characters, now yes there are a lot of shortcuts used here. Some addons will cost money or have free versions to use. Again these are the tools I currently use to make poses and animations. Yes, This is a very niche tutorial and straight to the point. You will not be using any paid add on until **Lesson 3 - Animation.** I did this to help everyone not feel pressured into buying anything until you feel more comfortable using Blender prior to making that leap into paid addons. So again please don't rush out and buy any addons. 1. **Addons** Blender has support for many awesome addons both internally that ship with blender and also install user made addons, To enable internal addons you go …. To install an external addon you go to preferences, Addons… Internal Addons - Need to Activate Please enable to following features within blender, Make Camera from View Images as Planes Addons - External 3rd Party : **AutoRigPro - (You won't use it until Lesson 3!)** This being a course for a very specific goal, the models you will use are already rigged and weighted, posed, etc. So for the first 2 lessons we will not be using AutorigPro, also to avoid information overload. The only feature being used by AutoRigPro will be the “Remapping” which is transferring the animation from one (mixamo) armatures to another in this case being your BG3 model used in this tutorial. 👏 Ahem 👏this👏is 👏a 👏huge👏time👏saver!👏 Cost :** $40 (Full) Auto-Rig Pro + Smart + Remap + Fbx Export** Link : [https://blendermarket.com/products/auto-rig-pro](https://blendermarket.com/products/auto-rig-pro) Free Version - NO **Animation Layers**. **(You won't use it until Lesson 3!)** This is to simplify the NLA Editing animation and to make it more user friendly and forgiving when combining multiple animations, plus it has a lot of features that really make the NLA editor less intimidating. 👏 Ahem 👏this👏is 👏a 👏huge👏time👏saver!👏 _Link - Price_ _Free Version - Yes_ **Polygon ( Used in Lesson 2 )** This addon is just an asset library from the Polygon site, we will be using it to import HDRIs to adjust the lighting and again make it easier for the sole purpose of our renders. **Free**! ( Optional! ) **Photographer 5 - ** # <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 2. Basic UI Setup Workflow</span> 1. Blender Layout 1. Quick Favorites Menu - “Q” button <p id="gdcalert2" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image2.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert3">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image2.png "image_tooltip") The Q button will be your best friend, you will map a lot of repeatable actions to the Q key, you can add actions by selecting over and right clicking “Add to Quick Favorites”. Your Quick Favorites are mode specific, so each mode will have a list of quick favorites, you will just need to re-add your quick actions within each mode. **Please Bind the Following Commands to your Quick Favorites :** 1. Walk Navigation ### This will enable you to use your “WASD” keys to move around the blender viewport space. You need to set up for each mode, (Object Mode, Edit Mode and Pose Mode). 2. Render Settings 2. Eevee 1. More faster less detail - Turn on bloom, motion blur, simply normals 3. Cycles 2. More GPU intensive longer rendering times - Ray Tracing Engine 4. View Porting Settings 3. For Eevee set to textured mode 4. For Cycle set the Viewport render down to 16 to 32 2. The Viewport 3. Object Mode - Tab 5. This is your default viewport, it mostly looks at the mesh and environment, it looks all nice and pretty. Which is awful for animating, because majority of your time will be in Pose Mode, 6. Yes the model will look ugly and the colors doodoo flat but you don't need your GPU stalling out when you are trying to pose and it's still busy trying to render the screen. 3. Edit Mode - Tab 4. Edit mode is to modify the mesh when you click on the mesh then switch to Edit Mode Note! If you click on the Armature then switch to Edit mode, you will be EDITING THE ARMATURE BONES! <span style="text-decoration:underline;">For this crash course, you will not be messing with the Edit Object Mode or the Armature Edit mode.</span> 4. Pose Mode - Ctrl + Tab 5. Armature Overview*When going into Pose Mode, to save your CPU and GPU some processing power, you must First Change the Viewport mode to Viewport Shading then click the small “V” and select Lighting leave as Studio and for Color change it to “Texture” <p id="gdcalert3" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image3.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert4">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image3.png "image_tooltip") Figure Lesson 1 - 2.1 6. 5. Shader / Material Properties 7. Overview 7. Nodes 8. Textures 9. UV Maps 10. 6. 5. # <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 3. Models & Rig used in this Tutorial </span> 1. BG3 Rigs / Models used in this tutorial Shadowheart by bobot from smutbase ( Used in Lesson 3 and 4) Link : [https://smutba.se/project/37102/](https://smutba.se/project/37102/) Orin the Red by bobot from smutbase ( Not used in Tutorial, but Explained) Link : [https://smutba.se/project/38182/](https://smutba.se/project/38182/) Kobold by SamagthraV2 from Open3DLab (Lesson 2) Link : [https://open3dlab.com/project/36936/](https://open3dlab.com/project/36936/) 2. Model Overview (Armatures, Rigs, etc) 1. We will go over the basics of each of the models in this tutorial and along the way provide terms and definitions of each of the components used within Blender. 2. An “**Armature**” is a type of object used for rigging, basically a skeleton. Armatures borrow the same structure (bones) from real-world skeletons. 3. A rig is the controls and strings that move a marionette (puppet). The Main takeaway is that Armature are more difficult to pose as compared to a fully controlled rigged character. The reason for this is because it lacks any IK / FK controls. So if you move the Hand, the rest of the arm and shoulder will not move. You will have to pose from the base bone in the chain. ( explain more later on) 1. This is an Armature : 1. <p id="gdcalert4" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image4.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert5">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image4.png "image_tooltip") This is a Rig: 2. <p id="gdcalert5" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image5.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert6">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image5.png "image_tooltip") 4. The Shadowheart body rig is a standard human rig equipped with "Rig Controllers." The main armature is entirely hidden, allowing for model posing exclusively through the rig controllers. 3. IK & FK Controls Rigged Characters will feature a lot of additional features such as IK & FK Kinematics to allow you to make movements akin to real world movements. IK stands for Inverse Kinematics, and FK stands for Forward Kinematics. Both are rig systems used to control characters or objects in animation, making the process more manageable and offering better control. **Differences and Uses**: FK operates on a chain system where moving a "parent" bone affects all connected "child" bones, ideal for sequential movement like swinging arms. IK, conversely, allows for moving a "child" bone to adjust the position of all parent bones up the chain, useful for precise end-point movements like positioning a hand. **When to Use Each System:** Typically, IK is used for parts that need to be positioned precisely, like feet that must stay planted on the ground, while FK is preferred for upper body movements unless interacting with objects. **Switching Between IK and FK:** Animators often switch between IK and FK to achieve the desired animation effect, such as during interactions with objects or dynamic movements, with rigs usually featuring built-in controllers for this purpose. _If you ever need a quick refresher, _ _The following video explains briefly the differences between IK & FK Kinematics._ [https://youtu.be/nGd7NlrT310?si=tR7PeaHe83GT71dR](https://youtu.be/nGd7NlrT310?si=tR7PeaHe83GT71dR) This is how IK in Pose Mode Blender looks like. [https://youtu.be/cZXPObAzGxE](https://youtu.be/cZXPObAzGxE) @https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cZXPObAzGxE When I grab the IK Hand control, the shoulder and the elbow follow the movements of the IK Hand control as IK controls are at the end of the bone chain. 2. Clothing Armatures 3. To Access the Armature for the following clothing, select the main rig 4. <p id="gdcalert6" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image6.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert7">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image6.png "image_tooltip") 3. Armature Bones for Blue Outfit - (Wave Queen) 4. <p id="gdcalert7" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image7.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert8">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image7.png "image_tooltip") 5. Armature Bones for White Outfit - Daisy Dress 6. <p id="gdcalert8" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image8.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert9">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image8.png "image_tooltip") 5. Orin the Red ( Used in Lesson 3 ) 5. Overview 6. Kobold ( Used in Lesson 2 ) 6. Overview 4. _What about Nyl’s BG3 Model ? _(Intermediate) 7. Nyl’s BG3 Model will be used in Lesson 4 where we will combine all the lessons learned from this tutorial. # <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 4. Blender UI Overview used in this tutorial</span> 1. ViewPort Mode. ( 1. TimeLine 2. Text 3. 2. The Shader Editor The Shader Editor is used to edit materials which are used for rendering. Materials used by Cycles and Eevee are defined using a node tree. Therefore, the main window of the Shader editor is a node editor. <p id="gdcalert9" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image9.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert10">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image9.png "image_tooltip") The Options panel in the Sidebar region contains the same settings that are also available in the Material tab in the Properties. They differ depending on the selected render engine. The settings are duplicated to make it possible to edit the entire material from the Shader editor. 3. 4. Creating a Pose 4. Pose Library 5. Camera Settings 1. 2. Creating an Animation 6. Camera Settings 3. Parenting Camera to Empty - Camera Dolly 5. Adding Scene Lighting 7. HDRI HDRIs are a 360 image with light data recorded in them, it will affect the entire blender environment for that scene. Think of it as “world lighting” which is how blender describes it 8. Emission Shader The emission shader is within the materials properties tab and this controls the amount of “glow” a particular material has. This is useful in making armor or small details glow, depending on the emission color it will glow that color, the stronger the emission value is the more glowy it will be and area it will cover. 6. Compositor Tab This is more like the Post Processing “Lightroom” once everything is done, you can add cinematic lighting nodes, color grading , etc but without modifying the objects themselves just on what the camera will see in the final render, for example, making a scene monochromatic will make everything black and white. # <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 5. Exporting</span> {#chapter-5-exporting} 1. Eevee 2. Cycles 3. Images 1. PNG 2. Videos 3. Filename Workflow 4. Post-Processing # The Kobold Tutorial 1. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Lesson 2 - The Kobold Tutorial</span> 1. Chapter 1. Creating your first Render Scene 1. Render settings 2. Viewport 3. Review Addons 4. Camera Setup 2. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 2. Importing / Appending</span> 5. BlenderKit - 6. Open3DLab - 7. Polygon - HDRI 8. Sketchfab - 3. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 3. Setting up your scene</span> 9. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 4. Pose Mode</span> 10. Armatures with Control Rigs 1. IK & FK Controls 11. Armatures without Control Rigs 2. Manually posing without FK / IK Controls 3. 4. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 5. Rig Basics</span> # Animation 1. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Lesson 3 - Animation</span> 1. Chapter 1. Animation Panels Overview The work flow I use consists of reference video, blocking out stages, in-betweens, cleaning up, camera tracking. 12 FPS in blender / export at 24 FPS I set the timeline into frames not timecode Create a block animation action, then send it to action editor Block out your poses, then saved them to the Pose Library When cleaning up, check for interpolation and key-smoothing. (think squash and stretch) Scene Lighting - i start with the standard 3-point lighting then pivot from there. Camera tracking - i place one camera on the Y axis and one on the X axis and 3rd in between the two. 1. Action Editor 2. Once you have recorded an animation on the timeline, you will want to create more animations, this is where the action editor is used. 3. Each animation will be labeled as an action. And you then can combine multiple actions. For example, a running action, then add a jumping action. Then a dancing action. 4. NLA Editor + Animation Layers - ( Non-Linear Action Editor ) 5. This is where the magic happens, in the NLA Editor you then can combine multiple actions. For example, a running action, then add a jumping action. Then a dancing action. Blender can do an “OK” job with merging them but this is where “Animation Layers” addon shines. As it gives you more freedom to switch between animations in the same armature and retains the base pose animation but without going to shit. 6. For Example - You have your character walking towards another but you want to add a head movement of them looking up and down and giving a smile. With the Animation layers, you just add another layer and then edit the head movements, then add the face shape keys layer, and the addon will merge all those separate animations together seamlessly. 2. Addons 7. Using AutoRigPro 8. Overview 9. SmartRig 10. ARP Remapping 3. Mixamo Animations 4. Rokoko Live 2. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 2. Importing Animation</span> 11. Not looking forward to this, this is the most painful process. 12. **_<span style="text-decoration:underline;">Motion capture is not perfect</span>_** 13. Mixamo 14. Rokoko 5. 3. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 3. Animating Weapons and Objects</span> 6. Child of Constraints 4. [https://www.pexels.com/photo/woman-in-blue-blazer-in-the-fitting-room-8307706/](https://www.pexels.com/photo/woman-in-blue-blazer-in-the-fitting-room-8307706/) 5. b63bed2d9f8a34d66977f22e59171925aec2ca10 9 8 2024-02-24T00:46:28Z Kuwelsco 2 wikitext text/x-wiki <p style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: ERRORs: 0; WARNINGs: 0; ALERTS: 9.</p> <ul style="color: red; font-weight: bold"><li>See top comment block for details on ERRORs and WARNINGs. <li>In the converted Markdown or HTML, search for inline alerts that start with >>>>> gd2md-html alert: for specific instances that need correction.</ul> <p style="color: red; font-weight: bold">Links to alert messages:</p><a href="#gdcalert1">alert1</a> <a href="#gdcalert2">alert2</a> <a href="#gdcalert3">alert3</a> <a href="#gdcalert4">alert4</a> <a href="#gdcalert5">alert5</a> <a href="#gdcalert6">alert6</a> <a href="#gdcalert7">alert7</a> <a href="#gdcalert8">alert8</a> <a href="#gdcalert9">alert9</a> <p style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> PLEASE check and correct alert issues and delete this message and the inline alerts.<hr></p> Hello! This requires some slight awareness of Blender. - Please Click on the Welcome to begin! [TOC] ## Welcome! {#welcome} ## Welcome! {#welcome} Basic Navigation - the Sidebar on the Left is the Chapter Outline, the Table of Contents below is the Sections and Lessons I set this layout this way so if you are having problems, you can easily refer to the Lesson Number and provide assistance if needed. 🚨🚨🚨Disclaimer🚨🚨🚨🚨 🚨🚨I’m not a fan of hardcore lewd stuff🚨🚨 Simple way to vibe check, is to use the _“Game of Thrones Test”_ (the TV show not the book! 😂) If anything is more spicy than what was shown on Game of Thrones then all that I ask is to please blur it out before asking for help. Lastly, NO DISSING KOBOLDS 😂or at least just not Popper The Businesslord ### _<span style="text-decoration:underline;">“So whats the goal of this Tutorial ?”</span>_ {#“so-whats-the-goal-of-this-tutorial-”} To help users to be more familiar with Blender and remove the harsh learning curve. I learned Blender from using FFXIV Game Models, So I strongly feel that by using content you are familiar with, that will also give you that extra motivation finishing your goal in learning Blender. This is also a way to further improve my own skills in Blender. To quote [Jim Kwik :](https://www.jimkwik.com/podcasts/kwik-brain-001-learning-anything-faster) * _If you want to cut your learning curve in half, learn with the intention of teaching it to somebody else._ * _If you had to give a presentation on what you’re learning today, you would learn it differently. You would pay closer attention. You would take more detailed notes. You would ask better questions._ * _When you teach something, You get to learn it twice._ ### _<span style="text-decoration:underline;">“Ok. So what will I learn in this tutorial?”</span>_ {#“ok-so-what-will-i-learn-in-this-tutorial-”} Able to use the Nyls Model and any other model from Open3DLab/Smutbase/Etc You would learn to pose your own scene render in Eevee similar to this Popper the Kobold here. <p id="gdcalert1" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image1.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert2">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image1.png "image_tooltip") Example 2 ### _<span style="text-decoration:underline;">“Sold! What Do I need to do?”</span>_ {#“sold-what-do-i-need-to-do-”} ## Chapter 1. Getting Started - Intro ### Blender 3.6 LTS {#blender-3-6-lts} **Please use Blender 3.6 LTS** Yes, there is Blender 4 out but 3.6 has the most addon compatibility at the moment. The goal of this tutorial is to simplify the learning curve of making simple animations in Blender using the BG3 characters, now yes there are a lot of shortcuts used here. Some addons will cost money or have free versions to use. Again these are the tools I currently use to make poses and animations. Yes, This is a very niche tutorial and straight to the point. You will not be using any paid add on until **Lesson 3 - Animation.** I did this to help everyone not feel pressured into buying anything until you feel more comfortable using Blender prior to making that leap into paid addons. So again please don't rush out and buy any addons. 1. **Addons** Blender has support for many awesome addons both internally that ship with blender and also install user made addons, To enable internal addons you go …. To install an external addon you go to preferences, Addons… Internal Addons - Need to Activate Please enable to following features within blender, Make Camera from View Images as Planes Addons - External 3rd Party : **AutoRigPro - (You won't use it until Lesson 3!)** This being a course for a very specific goal, the models you will use are already rigged and weighted, posed, etc. So for the first 2 lessons we will not be using AutorigPro, also to avoid information overload. The only feature being used by AutoRigPro will be the “Remapping” which is transferring the animation from one (mixamo) armatures to another in this case being your BG3 model used in this tutorial. 👏 Ahem 👏this👏is 👏a 👏huge👏time👏saver!👏 Cost :** $40 (Full) Auto-Rig Pro + Smart + Remap + Fbx Export** Link : [https://blendermarket.com/products/auto-rig-pro](https://blendermarket.com/products/auto-rig-pro) Free Version - NO **Animation Layers**. **(You won't use it until Lesson 3!)** This is to simplify the NLA Editing animation and to make it more user friendly and forgiving when combining multiple animations, plus it has a lot of features that really make the NLA editor less intimidating. 👏 Ahem 👏this👏is 👏a 👏huge👏time👏saver!👏 _Link - Price_ _Free Version - Yes_ **Polygon ( Used in Lesson 2 )** This addon is just an asset library from the Polygon site, we will be using it to import HDRIs to adjust the lighting and again make it easier for the sole purpose of our renders. **Free**! ( Optional! ) **Photographer 5 - ** ## <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 2. Basic UI Setup Workflow</span> 1. Blender Layout 1. Quick Favorites Menu - “Q” button <p id="gdcalert2" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image2.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert3">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image2.png "image_tooltip") The Q button will be your best friend, you will map a lot of repeatable actions to the Q key, you can add actions by selecting over and right clicking “Add to Quick Favorites”. Your Quick Favorites are mode specific, so each mode will have a list of quick favorites, you will just need to re-add your quick actions within each mode. **Please Bind the Following Commands to your Quick Favorites :** 1. Walk Navigation #### This will enable you to use your “WASD” keys to move around the blender viewport space. You need to set up for each mode, (Object Mode, Edit Mode and Pose Mode). 2. Render Settings 2. Eevee 1. More faster less detail - Turn on bloom, motion blur, simply normals 3. Cycles 2. More GPU intensive longer rendering times - Ray Tracing Engine 4. View Porting Settings 3. For Eevee set to textured mode 4. For Cycle set the Viewport render down to 16 to 32 2. The Viewport 3. Object Mode - Tab 5. This is your default viewport, it mostly looks at the mesh and environment, it looks all nice and pretty. Which is awful for animating, because majority of your time will be in Pose Mode, 6. Yes the model will look ugly and the colors doodoo flat but you don't need your GPU stalling out when you are trying to pose and it's still busy trying to render the screen. 3. Edit Mode - Tab 4. Edit mode is to modify the mesh when you click on the mesh then switch to Edit Mode Note! If you click on the Armature then switch to Edit mode, you will be EDITING THE ARMATURE BONES! <span style="text-decoration:underline;">For this crash course, you will not be messing with the Edit Object Mode or the Armature Edit mode.</span> 4. Pose Mode - Ctrl + Tab 5. Armature Overview*When going into Pose Mode, to save your CPU and GPU some processing power, you must First Change the Viewport mode to Viewport Shading then click the small “V” and select Lighting leave as Studio and for Color change it to “Texture” <p id="gdcalert3" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image3.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert4">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image3.png "image_tooltip") Figure Lesson 1 - 2.1 6. 5. Shader / Material Properties 7. Overview 7. Nodes 8. Textures 9. UV Maps 10. 6. 5. ## <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 3. Models & Rig used in this Tutorial </span> 1. BG3 Rigs / Models used in this tutorial Shadowheart by bobot from smutbase ( Used in Lesson 3 and 4) Link : [https://smutba.se/project/37102/](https://smutba.se/project/37102/) Orin the Red by bobot from smutbase ( Not used in Tutorial, but Explained) Link : [https://smutba.se/project/38182/](https://smutba.se/project/38182/) Kobold by SamagthraV2 from Open3DLab (Lesson 2) Link : [https://open3dlab.com/project/36936/](https://open3dlab.com/project/36936/) 2. Model Overview (Armatures, Rigs, etc) 1. We will go over the basics of each of the models in this tutorial and along the way provide terms and definitions of each of the components used within Blender. 2. An “**Armature**” is a type of object used for rigging, basically a skeleton. Armatures borrow the same structure (bones) from real-world skeletons. 3. A rig is the controls and strings that move a marionette (puppet). The Main takeaway is that Armature are more difficult to pose as compared to a fully controlled rigged character. The reason for this is because it lacks any IK / FK controls. So if you move the Hand, the rest of the arm and shoulder will not move. You will have to pose from the base bone in the chain. ( explain more later on) 1. This is an Armature : 1. <p id="gdcalert4" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image4.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert5">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image4.png "image_tooltip") This is a Rig: 2. <p id="gdcalert5" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image5.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert6">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image5.png "image_tooltip") 4. The Shadowheart body rig is a standard human rig equipped with "Rig Controllers." The main armature is entirely hidden, allowing for model posing exclusively through the rig controllers. 3. IK & FK Controls Rigged Characters will feature a lot of additional features such as IK & FK Kinematics to allow you to make movements akin to real world movements. IK stands for Inverse Kinematics, and FK stands for Forward Kinematics. Both are rig systems used to control characters or objects in animation, making the process more manageable and offering better control. **Differences and Uses**: FK operates on a chain system where moving a "parent" bone affects all connected "child" bones, ideal for sequential movement like swinging arms. IK, conversely, allows for moving a "child" bone to adjust the position of all parent bones up the chain, useful for precise end-point movements like positioning a hand. **When to Use Each System:** Typically, IK is used for parts that need to be positioned precisely, like feet that must stay planted on the ground, while FK is preferred for upper body movements unless interacting with objects. **Switching Between IK and FK:** Animators often switch between IK and FK to achieve the desired animation effect, such as during interactions with objects or dynamic movements, with rigs usually featuring built-in controllers for this purpose. _If you ever need a quick refresher, _ _The following video explains briefly the differences between IK & FK Kinematics._ [https://youtu.be/nGd7NlrT310?si=tR7PeaHe83GT71dR](https://youtu.be/nGd7NlrT310?si=tR7PeaHe83GT71dR) This is how IK in Pose Mode Blender looks like. [https://youtu.be/cZXPObAzGxE](https://youtu.be/cZXPObAzGxE) @https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cZXPObAzGxE When I grab the IK Hand control, the shoulder and the elbow follow the movements of the IK Hand control as IK controls are at the end of the bone chain. 2. Clothing Armatures 3. To Access the Armature for the following clothing, select the main rig 4. <p id="gdcalert6" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image6.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert7">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image6.png "image_tooltip") 3. Armature Bones for Blue Outfit - (Wave Queen) 4. <p id="gdcalert7" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image7.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert8">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image7.png "image_tooltip") 5. Armature Bones for White Outfit - Daisy Dress 6. <p id="gdcalert8" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image8.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert9">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image8.png "image_tooltip") 5. Orin the Red ( Used in Lesson 3 ) 5. Overview 6. Kobold ( Used in Lesson 2 ) 6. Overview 4. _What about Nyl’s BG3 Model ? _(Intermediate) 7. Nyl’s BG3 Model will be used in Lesson 4 where we will combine all the lessons learned from this tutorial. ## <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 4. Blender UI Overview used in this tutorial</span> 1. ViewPort Mode. ( 1. TimeLine 2. Text 3. 2. The Shader Editor The Shader Editor is used to edit materials which are used for rendering. Materials used by Cycles and Eevee are defined using a node tree. Therefore, the main window of the Shader editor is a node editor. <p id="gdcalert9" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image9.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert10">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image9.png "image_tooltip") The Options panel in the Sidebar region contains the same settings that are also available in the Material tab in the Properties. They differ depending on the selected render engine. The settings are duplicated to make it possible to edit the entire material from the Shader editor. 3. 4. Creating a Pose 4. Pose Library 5. Camera Settings 1. 2. Creating an Animation 6. Camera Settings 3. Parenting Camera to Empty - Camera Dolly 5. Adding Scene Lighting 7. HDRI HDRIs are a 360 image with light data recorded in them, it will affect the entire blender environment for that scene. Think of it as “world lighting” which is how blender describes it 8. Emission Shader The emission shader is within the materials properties tab and this controls the amount of “glow” a particular material has. This is useful in making armor or small details glow, depending on the emission color it will glow that color, the stronger the emission value is the more glowy it will be and area it will cover. 6. Compositor Tab This is more like the Post Processing “Lightroom” once everything is done, you can add cinematic lighting nodes, color grading , etc but without modifying the objects themselves just on what the camera will see in the final render, for example, making a scene monochromatic will make everything black and white. ## <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 5. Exporting</span> {#chapter-5-exporting} 1. Eevee 2. Cycles 3. Images 1. PNG 2. Videos 3. Filename Workflow 4. Post-Processing ## The Kobold Tutorial 1. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Lesson 2 - The Kobold Tutorial</span> 1. Chapter 1. Creating your first Render Scene 1. Render settings 2. Viewport 3. Review Addons 4. Camera Setup 2. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 2. Importing / Appending</span> 5. BlenderKit - 6. Open3DLab - 7. Polygon - HDRI 8. Sketchfab - 3. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 3. Setting up your scene</span> 9. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 4. Pose Mode</span> 10. Armatures with Control Rigs 1. IK & FK Controls 11. Armatures without Control Rigs 2. Manually posing without FK / IK Controls 3. 4. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 5. Rig Basics</span> ## Animation 1. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Lesson 3 - Animation</span> 1. Chapter 1. Animation Panels Overview The work flow I use consists of reference video, blocking out stages, in-betweens, cleaning up, camera tracking. 12 FPS in blender / export at 24 FPS I set the timeline into frames not timecode Create a block animation action, then send it to action editor Block out your poses, then saved them to the Pose Library When cleaning up, check for interpolation and key-smoothing. (think squash and stretch) Scene Lighting - i start with the standard 3-point lighting then pivot from there. Camera tracking - i place one camera on the Y axis and one on the X axis and 3rd in between the two. 1. Action Editor 2. Once you have recorded an animation on the timeline, you will want to create more animations, this is where the action editor is used. 3. Each animation will be labeled as an action. And you then can combine multiple actions. For example, a running action, then add a jumping action. Then a dancing action. 4. NLA Editor + Animation Layers - ( Non-Linear Action Editor ) 5. This is where the magic happens, in the NLA Editor you then can combine multiple actions. For example, a running action, then add a jumping action. Then a dancing action. Blender can do an “OK” job with merging them but this is where “Animation Layers” addon shines. As it gives you more freedom to switch between animations in the same armature and retains the base pose animation but without going to shit. 6. For Example - You have your character walking towards another but you want to add a head movement of them looking up and down and giving a smile. With the Animation layers, you just add another layer and then edit the head movements, then add the face shape keys layer, and the addon will merge all those separate animations together seamlessly. 2. Addons 7. Using AutoRigPro 8. Overview 9. SmartRig 10. ARP Remapping 3. Mixamo Animations 4. Rokoko Live 2. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 2. Importing Animation</span> 11. Not looking forward to this, this is the most painful process. 12. **_<span style="text-decoration:underline;">Motion capture is not perfect</span>_** 13. Mixamo 14. Rokoko 5. 3. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 3. Animating Weapons and Objects</span> 6. Child of Constraints 4. [https://www.pexels.com/photo/woman-in-blue-blazer-in-the-fitting-room-8307706/](https://www.pexels.com/photo/woman-in-blue-blazer-in-the-fitting-room-8307706/) 5. 93aa5a819d48bb6d8358520b7b50f2d21ba70d82 10 9 2024-02-24T00:46:44Z Kuwelsco 2 wikitext text/x-wiki Hello! This requires some slight awareness of Blender. - Please Click on the Welcome to begin! [TOC] ## Welcome! {#welcome} ## Welcome! {#welcome} Basic Navigation - the Sidebar on the Left is the Chapter Outline, the Table of Contents below is the Sections and Lessons I set this layout this way so if you are having problems, you can easily refer to the Lesson Number and provide assistance if needed. 🚨🚨🚨Disclaimer🚨🚨🚨🚨 🚨🚨I’m not a fan of hardcore lewd stuff🚨🚨 Simple way to vibe check, is to use the _“Game of Thrones Test”_ (the TV show not the book! 😂) If anything is more spicy than what was shown on Game of Thrones then all that I ask is to please blur it out before asking for help. Lastly, NO DISSING KOBOLDS 😂or at least just not Popper The Businesslord ### _<span style="text-decoration:underline;">“So whats the goal of this Tutorial ?”</span>_ {#“so-whats-the-goal-of-this-tutorial-”} To help users to be more familiar with Blender and remove the harsh learning curve. I learned Blender from using FFXIV Game Models, So I strongly feel that by using content you are familiar with, that will also give you that extra motivation finishing your goal in learning Blender. This is also a way to further improve my own skills in Blender. To quote [Jim Kwik :](https://www.jimkwik.com/podcasts/kwik-brain-001-learning-anything-faster) * _If you want to cut your learning curve in half, learn with the intention of teaching it to somebody else._ * _If you had to give a presentation on what you’re learning today, you would learn it differently. You would pay closer attention. You would take more detailed notes. You would ask better questions._ * _When you teach something, You get to learn it twice._ ### _<span style="text-decoration:underline;">“Ok. So what will I learn in this tutorial?”</span>_ {#“ok-so-what-will-i-learn-in-this-tutorial-”} Able to use the Nyls Model and any other model from Open3DLab/Smutbase/Etc You would learn to pose your own scene render in Eevee similar to this Popper the Kobold here. <p id="gdcalert1" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image1.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert2">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image1.png "image_tooltip") Example 2 ### _<span style="text-decoration:underline;">“Sold! What Do I need to do?”</span>_ {#“sold-what-do-i-need-to-do-”} ## Chapter 1. Getting Started - Intro ### Blender 3.6 LTS {#blender-3-6-lts} **Please use Blender 3.6 LTS** Yes, there is Blender 4 out but 3.6 has the most addon compatibility at the moment. The goal of this tutorial is to simplify the learning curve of making simple animations in Blender using the BG3 characters, now yes there are a lot of shortcuts used here. Some addons will cost money or have free versions to use. Again these are the tools I currently use to make poses and animations. Yes, This is a very niche tutorial and straight to the point. You will not be using any paid add on until **Lesson 3 - Animation.** I did this to help everyone not feel pressured into buying anything until you feel more comfortable using Blender prior to making that leap into paid addons. So again please don't rush out and buy any addons. 1. **Addons** Blender has support for many awesome addons both internally that ship with blender and also install user made addons, To enable internal addons you go …. To install an external addon you go to preferences, Addons… Internal Addons - Need to Activate Please enable to following features within blender, Make Camera from View Images as Planes Addons - External 3rd Party : **AutoRigPro - (You won't use it until Lesson 3!)** This being a course for a very specific goal, the models you will use are already rigged and weighted, posed, etc. So for the first 2 lessons we will not be using AutorigPro, also to avoid information overload. The only feature being used by AutoRigPro will be the “Remapping” which is transferring the animation from one (mixamo) armatures to another in this case being your BG3 model used in this tutorial. 👏 Ahem 👏this👏is 👏a 👏huge👏time👏saver!👏 Cost :** $40 (Full) Auto-Rig Pro + Smart + Remap + Fbx Export** Link : [https://blendermarket.com/products/auto-rig-pro](https://blendermarket.com/products/auto-rig-pro) Free Version - NO **Animation Layers**. **(You won't use it until Lesson 3!)** This is to simplify the NLA Editing animation and to make it more user friendly and forgiving when combining multiple animations, plus it has a lot of features that really make the NLA editor less intimidating. 👏 Ahem 👏this👏is 👏a 👏huge👏time👏saver!👏 _Link - Price_ _Free Version - Yes_ **Polygon ( Used in Lesson 2 )** This addon is just an asset library from the Polygon site, we will be using it to import HDRIs to adjust the lighting and again make it easier for the sole purpose of our renders. **Free**! ( Optional! ) **Photographer 5 - ** ## <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 2. Basic UI Setup Workflow</span> 1. Blender Layout 1. Quick Favorites Menu - “Q” button <p id="gdcalert2" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image2.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert3">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image2.png "image_tooltip") The Q button will be your best friend, you will map a lot of repeatable actions to the Q key, you can add actions by selecting over and right clicking “Add to Quick Favorites”. Your Quick Favorites are mode specific, so each mode will have a list of quick favorites, you will just need to re-add your quick actions within each mode. **Please Bind the Following Commands to your Quick Favorites :** 1. Walk Navigation #### This will enable you to use your “WASD” keys to move around the blender viewport space. You need to set up for each mode, (Object Mode, Edit Mode and Pose Mode). 2. Render Settings 2. Eevee 1. More faster less detail - Turn on bloom, motion blur, simply normals 3. Cycles 2. More GPU intensive longer rendering times - Ray Tracing Engine 4. View Porting Settings 3. For Eevee set to textured mode 4. For Cycle set the Viewport render down to 16 to 32 2. The Viewport 3. Object Mode - Tab 5. This is your default viewport, it mostly looks at the mesh and environment, it looks all nice and pretty. Which is awful for animating, because majority of your time will be in Pose Mode, 6. Yes the model will look ugly and the colors doodoo flat but you don't need your GPU stalling out when you are trying to pose and it's still busy trying to render the screen. 3. Edit Mode - Tab 4. Edit mode is to modify the mesh when you click on the mesh then switch to Edit Mode Note! If you click on the Armature then switch to Edit mode, you will be EDITING THE ARMATURE BONES! <span style="text-decoration:underline;">For this crash course, you will not be messing with the Edit Object Mode or the Armature Edit mode.</span> 4. Pose Mode - Ctrl + Tab 5. Armature Overview*When going into Pose Mode, to save your CPU and GPU some processing power, you must First Change the Viewport mode to Viewport Shading then click the small “V” and select Lighting leave as Studio and for Color change it to “Texture” <p id="gdcalert3" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image3.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert4">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image3.png "image_tooltip") Figure Lesson 1 - 2.1 6. 5. Shader / Material Properties 7. Overview 7. Nodes 8. Textures 9. UV Maps 10. 6. 5. ## <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 3. Models & Rig used in this Tutorial </span> 1. BG3 Rigs / Models used in this tutorial Shadowheart by bobot from smutbase ( Used in Lesson 3 and 4) Link : [https://smutba.se/project/37102/](https://smutba.se/project/37102/) Orin the Red by bobot from smutbase ( Not used in Tutorial, but Explained) Link : [https://smutba.se/project/38182/](https://smutba.se/project/38182/) Kobold by SamagthraV2 from Open3DLab (Lesson 2) Link : [https://open3dlab.com/project/36936/](https://open3dlab.com/project/36936/) 2. Model Overview (Armatures, Rigs, etc) 1. We will go over the basics of each of the models in this tutorial and along the way provide terms and definitions of each of the components used within Blender. 2. An “**Armature**” is a type of object used for rigging, basically a skeleton. Armatures borrow the same structure (bones) from real-world skeletons. 3. A rig is the controls and strings that move a marionette (puppet). The Main takeaway is that Armature are more difficult to pose as compared to a fully controlled rigged character. The reason for this is because it lacks any IK / FK controls. So if you move the Hand, the rest of the arm and shoulder will not move. You will have to pose from the base bone in the chain. ( explain more later on) 1. This is an Armature : 1. <p id="gdcalert4" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image4.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert5">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image4.png "image_tooltip") This is a Rig: 2. <p id="gdcalert5" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image5.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert6">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image5.png "image_tooltip") 4. The Shadowheart body rig is a standard human rig equipped with "Rig Controllers." The main armature is entirely hidden, allowing for model posing exclusively through the rig controllers. 3. IK & FK Controls Rigged Characters will feature a lot of additional features such as IK & FK Kinematics to allow you to make movements akin to real world movements. IK stands for Inverse Kinematics, and FK stands for Forward Kinematics. Both are rig systems used to control characters or objects in animation, making the process more manageable and offering better control. **Differences and Uses**: FK operates on a chain system where moving a "parent" bone affects all connected "child" bones, ideal for sequential movement like swinging arms. IK, conversely, allows for moving a "child" bone to adjust the position of all parent bones up the chain, useful for precise end-point movements like positioning a hand. **When to Use Each System:** Typically, IK is used for parts that need to be positioned precisely, like feet that must stay planted on the ground, while FK is preferred for upper body movements unless interacting with objects. **Switching Between IK and FK:** Animators often switch between IK and FK to achieve the desired animation effect, such as during interactions with objects or dynamic movements, with rigs usually featuring built-in controllers for this purpose. _If you ever need a quick refresher, _ _The following video explains briefly the differences between IK & FK Kinematics._ [https://youtu.be/nGd7NlrT310?si=tR7PeaHe83GT71dR](https://youtu.be/nGd7NlrT310?si=tR7PeaHe83GT71dR) This is how IK in Pose Mode Blender looks like. [https://youtu.be/cZXPObAzGxE](https://youtu.be/cZXPObAzGxE) @https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cZXPObAzGxE When I grab the IK Hand control, the shoulder and the elbow follow the movements of the IK Hand control as IK controls are at the end of the bone chain. 2. Clothing Armatures 3. To Access the Armature for the following clothing, select the main rig 4. <p id="gdcalert6" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image6.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert7">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image6.png "image_tooltip") 3. Armature Bones for Blue Outfit - (Wave Queen) 4. <p id="gdcalert7" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image7.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert8">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image7.png "image_tooltip") 5. Armature Bones for White Outfit - Daisy Dress 6. <p id="gdcalert8" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image8.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert9">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image8.png "image_tooltip") 5. Orin the Red ( Used in Lesson 3 ) 5. Overview 6. Kobold ( Used in Lesson 2 ) 6. Overview 4. _What about Nyl’s BG3 Model ? _(Intermediate) 7. Nyl’s BG3 Model will be used in Lesson 4 where we will combine all the lessons learned from this tutorial. ## <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 4. Blender UI Overview used in this tutorial</span> 1. ViewPort Mode. ( 1. TimeLine 2. Text 3. 2. The Shader Editor The Shader Editor is used to edit materials which are used for rendering. Materials used by Cycles and Eevee are defined using a node tree. Therefore, the main window of the Shader editor is a node editor. <p id="gdcalert9" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image9.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert10">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image9.png "image_tooltip") The Options panel in the Sidebar region contains the same settings that are also available in the Material tab in the Properties. They differ depending on the selected render engine. The settings are duplicated to make it possible to edit the entire material from the Shader editor. 3. 4. Creating a Pose 4. Pose Library 5. Camera Settings 1. 2. Creating an Animation 6. Camera Settings 3. Parenting Camera to Empty - Camera Dolly 5. Adding Scene Lighting 7. HDRI HDRIs are a 360 image with light data recorded in them, it will affect the entire blender environment for that scene. Think of it as “world lighting” which is how blender describes it 8. Emission Shader The emission shader is within the materials properties tab and this controls the amount of “glow” a particular material has. This is useful in making armor or small details glow, depending on the emission color it will glow that color, the stronger the emission value is the more glowy it will be and area it will cover. 6. Compositor Tab This is more like the Post Processing “Lightroom” once everything is done, you can add cinematic lighting nodes, color grading , etc but without modifying the objects themselves just on what the camera will see in the final render, for example, making a scene monochromatic will make everything black and white. ## <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 5. Exporting</span> {#chapter-5-exporting} 1. Eevee 2. Cycles 3. Images 1. PNG 2. Videos 3. Filename Workflow 4. Post-Processing ## The Kobold Tutorial 1. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Lesson 2 - The Kobold Tutorial</span> 1. Chapter 1. Creating your first Render Scene 1. Render settings 2. Viewport 3. Review Addons 4. Camera Setup 2. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 2. Importing / Appending</span> 5. BlenderKit - 6. Open3DLab - 7. Polygon - HDRI 8. Sketchfab - 3. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 3. Setting up your scene</span> 9. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 4. Pose Mode</span> 10. Armatures with Control Rigs 1. IK & FK Controls 11. Armatures without Control Rigs 2. Manually posing without FK / IK Controls 3. 4. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 5. Rig Basics</span> ## Animation 1. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Lesson 3 - Animation</span> 1. Chapter 1. Animation Panels Overview The work flow I use consists of reference video, blocking out stages, in-betweens, cleaning up, camera tracking. 12 FPS in blender / export at 24 FPS I set the timeline into frames not timecode Create a block animation action, then send it to action editor Block out your poses, then saved them to the Pose Library When cleaning up, check for interpolation and key-smoothing. (think squash and stretch) Scene Lighting - i start with the standard 3-point lighting then pivot from there. Camera tracking - i place one camera on the Y axis and one on the X axis and 3rd in between the two. 1. Action Editor 2. Once you have recorded an animation on the timeline, you will want to create more animations, this is where the action editor is used. 3. Each animation will be labeled as an action. And you then can combine multiple actions. For example, a running action, then add a jumping action. Then a dancing action. 4. NLA Editor + Animation Layers - ( Non-Linear Action Editor ) 5. This is where the magic happens, in the NLA Editor you then can combine multiple actions. For example, a running action, then add a jumping action. Then a dancing action. Blender can do an “OK” job with merging them but this is where “Animation Layers” addon shines. As it gives you more freedom to switch between animations in the same armature and retains the base pose animation but without going to shit. 6. For Example - You have your character walking towards another but you want to add a head movement of them looking up and down and giving a smile. With the Animation layers, you just add another layer and then edit the head movements, then add the face shape keys layer, and the addon will merge all those separate animations together seamlessly. 2. Addons 7. Using AutoRigPro 8. Overview 9. SmartRig 10. ARP Remapping 3. Mixamo Animations 4. Rokoko Live 2. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 2. Importing Animation</span> 11. Not looking forward to this, this is the most painful process. 12. **_<span style="text-decoration:underline;">Motion capture is not perfect</span>_** 13. Mixamo 14. Rokoko 5. 3. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 3. Animating Weapons and Objects</span> 6. Child of Constraints 4. [https://www.pexels.com/photo/woman-in-blue-blazer-in-the-fitting-room-8307706/](https://www.pexels.com/photo/woman-in-blue-blazer-in-the-fitting-room-8307706/) 5. 1b26fc8718177b060f79130300cebec6c4c00ff8 11 10 2024-02-24T00:48:48Z Kuwelsco 2 wikitext text/x-wiki Hello! This requires some slight awareness of Blender. - Please Click on the Welcome to begin! [TOC] ** target|link text ## Welcome! {#welcome} ## Welcome! {#welcome} Basic Navigation - the Sidebar on the Left is the Chapter Outline, the Table of Contents below is the Sections and Lessons I set this layout this way so if you are having problems, you can easily refer to the Lesson Number and provide assistance if needed. 🚨🚨🚨Disclaimer🚨🚨🚨🚨 🚨🚨I’m not a fan of hardcore lewd stuff🚨🚨 Simple way to vibe check, is to use the _“Game of Thrones Test”_ (the TV show not the book! 😂) If anything is more spicy than what was shown on Game of Thrones then all that I ask is to please blur it out before asking for help. Lastly, NO DISSING KOBOLDS 😂or at least just not Popper The Businesslord ### _<span style="text-decoration:underline;">“So whats the goal of this Tutorial ?”</span>_ {#“so-whats-the-goal-of-this-tutorial-”} To help users to be more familiar with Blender and remove the harsh learning curve. I learned Blender from using FFXIV Game Models, So I strongly feel that by using content you are familiar with, that will also give you that extra motivation finishing your goal in learning Blender. This is also a way to further improve my own skills in Blender. To quote [Jim Kwik :](https://www.jimkwik.com/podcasts/kwik-brain-001-learning-anything-faster) * _If you want to cut your learning curve in half, learn with the intention of teaching it to somebody else._ * _If you had to give a presentation on what you’re learning today, you would learn it differently. You would pay closer attention. You would take more detailed notes. You would ask better questions._ * _When you teach something, You get to learn it twice._ ### _<span style="text-decoration:underline;">“Ok. So what will I learn in this tutorial?”</span>_ {#“ok-so-what-will-i-learn-in-this-tutorial-”} Able to use the Nyls Model and any other model from Open3DLab/Smutbase/Etc You would learn to pose your own scene render in Eevee similar to this Popper the Kobold here. <p id="gdcalert1" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image1.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert2">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image1.png "image_tooltip") Example 2 ### _<span style="text-decoration:underline;">“Sold! What Do I need to do?”</span>_ {#“sold-what-do-i-need-to-do-”} ## Chapter 1. Getting Started - Intro ### Blender 3.6 LTS {#blender-3-6-lts} **Please use Blender 3.6 LTS** Yes, there is Blender 4 out but 3.6 has the most addon compatibility at the moment. The goal of this tutorial is to simplify the learning curve of making simple animations in Blender using the BG3 characters, now yes there are a lot of shortcuts used here. Some addons will cost money or have free versions to use. Again these are the tools I currently use to make poses and animations. Yes, This is a very niche tutorial and straight to the point. You will not be using any paid add on until **Lesson 3 - Animation.** I did this to help everyone not feel pressured into buying anything until you feel more comfortable using Blender prior to making that leap into paid addons. So again please don't rush out and buy any addons. 1. **Addons** Blender has support for many awesome addons both internally that ship with blender and also install user made addons, To enable internal addons you go …. To install an external addon you go to preferences, Addons… Internal Addons - Need to Activate Please enable to following features within blender, Make Camera from View Images as Planes Addons - External 3rd Party : **AutoRigPro - (You won't use it until Lesson 3!)** This being a course for a very specific goal, the models you will use are already rigged and weighted, posed, etc. So for the first 2 lessons we will not be using AutorigPro, also to avoid information overload. The only feature being used by AutoRigPro will be the “Remapping” which is transferring the animation from one (mixamo) armatures to another in this case being your BG3 model used in this tutorial. 👏 Ahem 👏this👏is 👏a 👏huge👏time👏saver!👏 Cost :** $40 (Full) Auto-Rig Pro + Smart + Remap + Fbx Export** Link : [https://blendermarket.com/products/auto-rig-pro](https://blendermarket.com/products/auto-rig-pro) Free Version - NO **Animation Layers**. **(You won't use it until Lesson 3!)** This is to simplify the NLA Editing animation and to make it more user friendly and forgiving when combining multiple animations, plus it has a lot of features that really make the NLA editor less intimidating. 👏 Ahem 👏this👏is 👏a 👏huge👏time👏saver!👏 _Link - Price_ _Free Version - Yes_ **Polygon ( Used in Lesson 2 )** This addon is just an asset library from the Polygon site, we will be using it to import HDRIs to adjust the lighting and again make it easier for the sole purpose of our renders. **Free**! ( Optional! ) **Photographer 5 - ** ## <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 2. Basic UI Setup Workflow</span> 1. Blender Layout 1. Quick Favorites Menu - “Q” button <p id="gdcalert2" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image2.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert3">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image2.png "image_tooltip") The Q button will be your best friend, you will map a lot of repeatable actions to the Q key, you can add actions by selecting over and right clicking “Add to Quick Favorites”. Your Quick Favorites are mode specific, so each mode will have a list of quick favorites, you will just need to re-add your quick actions within each mode. **Please Bind the Following Commands to your Quick Favorites :** 1. Walk Navigation #### This will enable you to use your “WASD” keys to move around the blender viewport space. You need to set up for each mode, (Object Mode, Edit Mode and Pose Mode). 2. Render Settings 2. Eevee 1. More faster less detail - Turn on bloom, motion blur, simply normals 3. Cycles 2. More GPU intensive longer rendering times - Ray Tracing Engine 4. View Porting Settings 3. For Eevee set to textured mode 4. For Cycle set the Viewport render down to 16 to 32 2. The Viewport 3. Object Mode - Tab 5. This is your default viewport, it mostly looks at the mesh and environment, it looks all nice and pretty. Which is awful for animating, because majority of your time will be in Pose Mode, 6. Yes the model will look ugly and the colors doodoo flat but you don't need your GPU stalling out when you are trying to pose and it's still busy trying to render the screen. 3. Edit Mode - Tab 4. Edit mode is to modify the mesh when you click on the mesh then switch to Edit Mode Note! If you click on the Armature then switch to Edit mode, you will be EDITING THE ARMATURE BONES! <span style="text-decoration:underline;">For this crash course, you will not be messing with the Edit Object Mode or the Armature Edit mode.</span> 4. Pose Mode - Ctrl + Tab 5. Armature Overview*When going into Pose Mode, to save your CPU and GPU some processing power, you must First Change the Viewport mode to Viewport Shading then click the small “V” and select Lighting leave as Studio and for Color change it to “Texture” <p id="gdcalert3" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image3.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert4">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image3.png "image_tooltip") Figure Lesson 1 - 2.1 6. 5. Shader / Material Properties 7. Overview 7. Nodes 8. Textures 9. UV Maps 10. 6. 5. ## <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 3. Models & Rig used in this Tutorial </span> 1. BG3 Rigs / Models used in this tutorial Shadowheart by bobot from smutbase ( Used in Lesson 3 and 4) Link : [https://smutba.se/project/37102/](https://smutba.se/project/37102/) Orin the Red by bobot from smutbase ( Not used in Tutorial, but Explained) Link : [https://smutba.se/project/38182/](https://smutba.se/project/38182/) Kobold by SamagthraV2 from Open3DLab (Lesson 2) Link : [https://open3dlab.com/project/36936/](https://open3dlab.com/project/36936/) 2. Model Overview (Armatures, Rigs, etc) 1. We will go over the basics of each of the models in this tutorial and along the way provide terms and definitions of each of the components used within Blender. 2. An “**Armature**” is a type of object used for rigging, basically a skeleton. Armatures borrow the same structure (bones) from real-world skeletons. 3. A rig is the controls and strings that move a marionette (puppet). The Main takeaway is that Armature are more difficult to pose as compared to a fully controlled rigged character. The reason for this is because it lacks any IK / FK controls. So if you move the Hand, the rest of the arm and shoulder will not move. You will have to pose from the base bone in the chain. ( explain more later on) 1. This is an Armature : 1. <p id="gdcalert4" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image4.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert5">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image4.png "image_tooltip") This is a Rig: 2. <p id="gdcalert5" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image5.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert6">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image5.png "image_tooltip") 4. The Shadowheart body rig is a standard human rig equipped with "Rig Controllers." The main armature is entirely hidden, allowing for model posing exclusively through the rig controllers. 3. IK & FK Controls Rigged Characters will feature a lot of additional features such as IK & FK Kinematics to allow you to make movements akin to real world movements. IK stands for Inverse Kinematics, and FK stands for Forward Kinematics. Both are rig systems used to control characters or objects in animation, making the process more manageable and offering better control. **Differences and Uses**: FK operates on a chain system where moving a "parent" bone affects all connected "child" bones, ideal for sequential movement like swinging arms. IK, conversely, allows for moving a "child" bone to adjust the position of all parent bones up the chain, useful for precise end-point movements like positioning a hand. **When to Use Each System:** Typically, IK is used for parts that need to be positioned precisely, like feet that must stay planted on the ground, while FK is preferred for upper body movements unless interacting with objects. **Switching Between IK and FK:** Animators often switch between IK and FK to achieve the desired animation effect, such as during interactions with objects or dynamic movements, with rigs usually featuring built-in controllers for this purpose. _If you ever need a quick refresher, _ _The following video explains briefly the differences between IK & FK Kinematics._ [https://youtu.be/nGd7NlrT310?si=tR7PeaHe83GT71dR](https://youtu.be/nGd7NlrT310?si=tR7PeaHe83GT71dR) This is how IK in Pose Mode Blender looks like. [https://youtu.be/cZXPObAzGxE](https://youtu.be/cZXPObAzGxE) @https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cZXPObAzGxE When I grab the IK Hand control, the shoulder and the elbow follow the movements of the IK Hand control as IK controls are at the end of the bone chain. 2. Clothing Armatures 3. To Access the Armature for the following clothing, select the main rig 4. <p id="gdcalert6" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image6.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert7">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image6.png "image_tooltip") 3. Armature Bones for Blue Outfit - (Wave Queen) 4. <p id="gdcalert7" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image7.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert8">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image7.png "image_tooltip") 5. Armature Bones for White Outfit - Daisy Dress 6. <p id="gdcalert8" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image8.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert9">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image8.png "image_tooltip") 5. Orin the Red ( Used in Lesson 3 ) 5. Overview 6. Kobold ( Used in Lesson 2 ) 6. Overview 4. _What about Nyl’s BG3 Model ? _(Intermediate) 7. Nyl’s BG3 Model will be used in Lesson 4 where we will combine all the lessons learned from this tutorial. ## <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 4. Blender UI Overview used in this tutorial</span> 1. ViewPort Mode. ( 1. TimeLine 2. Text 3. 2. The Shader Editor The Shader Editor is used to edit materials which are used for rendering. Materials used by Cycles and Eevee are defined using a node tree. Therefore, the main window of the Shader editor is a node editor. <p id="gdcalert9" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image9.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert10">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image9.png "image_tooltip") The Options panel in the Sidebar region contains the same settings that are also available in the Material tab in the Properties. They differ depending on the selected render engine. The settings are duplicated to make it possible to edit the entire material from the Shader editor. 3. 4. Creating a Pose 4. Pose Library 5. Camera Settings 1. 2. Creating an Animation 6. Camera Settings 3. Parenting Camera to Empty - Camera Dolly 5. Adding Scene Lighting 7. HDRI HDRIs are a 360 image with light data recorded in them, it will affect the entire blender environment for that scene. Think of it as “world lighting” which is how blender describes it 8. Emission Shader The emission shader is within the materials properties tab and this controls the amount of “glow” a particular material has. This is useful in making armor or small details glow, depending on the emission color it will glow that color, the stronger the emission value is the more glowy it will be and area it will cover. 6. Compositor Tab This is more like the Post Processing “Lightroom” once everything is done, you can add cinematic lighting nodes, color grading , etc but without modifying the objects themselves just on what the camera will see in the final render, for example, making a scene monochromatic will make everything black and white. ## <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 5. Exporting</span> {#chapter-5-exporting} 1. Eevee 2. Cycles 3. Images 1. PNG 2. Videos 3. Filename Workflow 4. Post-Processing ## The Kobold Tutorial 1. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Lesson 2 - The Kobold Tutorial</span> 1. Chapter 1. Creating your first Render Scene 1. Render settings 2. Viewport 3. Review Addons 4. Camera Setup 2. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 2. Importing / Appending</span> 5. BlenderKit - 6. Open3DLab - 7. Polygon - HDRI 8. Sketchfab - 3. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 3. Setting up your scene</span> 9. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 4. Pose Mode</span> 10. Armatures with Control Rigs 1. IK & FK Controls 11. Armatures without Control Rigs 2. Manually posing without FK / IK Controls 3. 4. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 5. Rig Basics</span> ## Animation 1. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Lesson 3 - Animation</span> 1. Chapter 1. Animation Panels Overview The work flow I use consists of reference video, blocking out stages, in-betweens, cleaning up, camera tracking. 12 FPS in blender / export at 24 FPS I set the timeline into frames not timecode Create a block animation action, then send it to action editor Block out your poses, then saved them to the Pose Library When cleaning up, check for interpolation and key-smoothing. (think squash and stretch) Scene Lighting - i start with the standard 3-point lighting then pivot from there. Camera tracking - i place one camera on the Y axis and one on the X axis and 3rd in between the two. 1. Action Editor 2. Once you have recorded an animation on the timeline, you will want to create more animations, this is where the action editor is used. 3. Each animation will be labeled as an action. And you then can combine multiple actions. For example, a running action, then add a jumping action. Then a dancing action. 4. NLA Editor + Animation Layers - ( Non-Linear Action Editor ) 5. This is where the magic happens, in the NLA Editor you then can combine multiple actions. For example, a running action, then add a jumping action. Then a dancing action. Blender can do an “OK” job with merging them but this is where “Animation Layers” addon shines. As it gives you more freedom to switch between animations in the same armature and retains the base pose animation but without going to shit. 6. For Example - You have your character walking towards another but you want to add a head movement of them looking up and down and giving a smile. With the Animation layers, you just add another layer and then edit the head movements, then add the face shape keys layer, and the addon will merge all those separate animations together seamlessly. 2. Addons 7. Using AutoRigPro 8. Overview 9. SmartRig 10. ARP Remapping 3. Mixamo Animations 4. Rokoko Live 2. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 2. Importing Animation</span> 11. Not looking forward to this, this is the most painful process. 12. **_<span style="text-decoration:underline;">Motion capture is not perfect</span>_** 13. Mixamo 14. Rokoko 5. 3. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 3. Animating Weapons and Objects</span> 6. Child of Constraints 4. [https://www.pexels.com/photo/woman-in-blue-blazer-in-the-fitting-room-8307706/](https://www.pexels.com/photo/woman-in-blue-blazer-in-the-fitting-room-8307706/) 5. 1699061852ffc6e8a71e9a82883facfd65a5dd15 12 11 2024-02-24T00:49:19Z Kuwelsco 2 wikitext text/x-wiki Hello! This requires some slight awareness of Blender. - Please Click on the Welcome to begin! [TOC] * navigation ** mainpage|Accueil ** Special:RecentChanges|Recent changes * new heading ** portal-url|Forums ** https://www.mediawiki.org|MediaWiki home ## Welcome! {#welcome} ## Welcome! {#welcome} Basic Navigation - the Sidebar on the Left is the Chapter Outline, the Table of Contents below is the Sections and Lessons I set this layout this way so if you are having problems, you can easily refer to the Lesson Number and provide assistance if needed. 🚨🚨🚨Disclaimer🚨🚨🚨🚨 🚨🚨I’m not a fan of hardcore lewd stuff🚨🚨 Simple way to vibe check, is to use the _“Game of Thrones Test”_ (the TV show not the book! 😂) If anything is more spicy than what was shown on Game of Thrones then all that I ask is to please blur it out before asking for help. Lastly, NO DISSING KOBOLDS 😂or at least just not Popper The Businesslord ### _<span style="text-decoration:underline;">“So whats the goal of this Tutorial ?”</span>_ {#“so-whats-the-goal-of-this-tutorial-”} To help users to be more familiar with Blender and remove the harsh learning curve. I learned Blender from using FFXIV Game Models, So I strongly feel that by using content you are familiar with, that will also give you that extra motivation finishing your goal in learning Blender. This is also a way to further improve my own skills in Blender. To quote [Jim Kwik :](https://www.jimkwik.com/podcasts/kwik-brain-001-learning-anything-faster) * _If you want to cut your learning curve in half, learn with the intention of teaching it to somebody else._ * _If you had to give a presentation on what you’re learning today, you would learn it differently. You would pay closer attention. You would take more detailed notes. You would ask better questions._ * _When you teach something, You get to learn it twice._ ### _<span style="text-decoration:underline;">“Ok. So what will I learn in this tutorial?”</span>_ {#“ok-so-what-will-i-learn-in-this-tutorial-”} Able to use the Nyls Model and any other model from Open3DLab/Smutbase/Etc You would learn to pose your own scene render in Eevee similar to this Popper the Kobold here. <p id="gdcalert1" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image1.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert2">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image1.png "image_tooltip") Example 2 ### _<span style="text-decoration:underline;">“Sold! What Do I need to do?”</span>_ {#“sold-what-do-i-need-to-do-”} ## Chapter 1. Getting Started - Intro ### Blender 3.6 LTS {#blender-3-6-lts} **Please use Blender 3.6 LTS** Yes, there is Blender 4 out but 3.6 has the most addon compatibility at the moment. The goal of this tutorial is to simplify the learning curve of making simple animations in Blender using the BG3 characters, now yes there are a lot of shortcuts used here. Some addons will cost money or have free versions to use. Again these are the tools I currently use to make poses and animations. Yes, This is a very niche tutorial and straight to the point. You will not be using any paid add on until **Lesson 3 - Animation.** I did this to help everyone not feel pressured into buying anything until you feel more comfortable using Blender prior to making that leap into paid addons. So again please don't rush out and buy any addons. 1. **Addons** Blender has support for many awesome addons both internally that ship with blender and also install user made addons, To enable internal addons you go …. To install an external addon you go to preferences, Addons… Internal Addons - Need to Activate Please enable to following features within blender, Make Camera from View Images as Planes Addons - External 3rd Party : **AutoRigPro - (You won't use it until Lesson 3!)** This being a course for a very specific goal, the models you will use are already rigged and weighted, posed, etc. So for the first 2 lessons we will not be using AutorigPro, also to avoid information overload. The only feature being used by AutoRigPro will be the “Remapping” which is transferring the animation from one (mixamo) armatures to another in this case being your BG3 model used in this tutorial. 👏 Ahem 👏this👏is 👏a 👏huge👏time👏saver!👏 Cost :** $40 (Full) Auto-Rig Pro + Smart + Remap + Fbx Export** Link : [https://blendermarket.com/products/auto-rig-pro](https://blendermarket.com/products/auto-rig-pro) Free Version - NO **Animation Layers**. **(You won't use it until Lesson 3!)** This is to simplify the NLA Editing animation and to make it more user friendly and forgiving when combining multiple animations, plus it has a lot of features that really make the NLA editor less intimidating. 👏 Ahem 👏this👏is 👏a 👏huge👏time👏saver!👏 _Link - Price_ _Free Version - Yes_ **Polygon ( Used in Lesson 2 )** This addon is just an asset library from the Polygon site, we will be using it to import HDRIs to adjust the lighting and again make it easier for the sole purpose of our renders. **Free**! ( Optional! ) **Photographer 5 - ** ## <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 2. Basic UI Setup Workflow</span> 1. Blender Layout 1. Quick Favorites Menu - “Q” button <p id="gdcalert2" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image2.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert3">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image2.png "image_tooltip") The Q button will be your best friend, you will map a lot of repeatable actions to the Q key, you can add actions by selecting over and right clicking “Add to Quick Favorites”. Your Quick Favorites are mode specific, so each mode will have a list of quick favorites, you will just need to re-add your quick actions within each mode. **Please Bind the Following Commands to your Quick Favorites :** 1. Walk Navigation #### This will enable you to use your “WASD” keys to move around the blender viewport space. You need to set up for each mode, (Object Mode, Edit Mode and Pose Mode). 2. Render Settings 2. Eevee 1. More faster less detail - Turn on bloom, motion blur, simply normals 3. Cycles 2. More GPU intensive longer rendering times - Ray Tracing Engine 4. View Porting Settings 3. For Eevee set to textured mode 4. For Cycle set the Viewport render down to 16 to 32 2. The Viewport 3. Object Mode - Tab 5. This is your default viewport, it mostly looks at the mesh and environment, it looks all nice and pretty. Which is awful for animating, because majority of your time will be in Pose Mode, 6. Yes the model will look ugly and the colors doodoo flat but you don't need your GPU stalling out when you are trying to pose and it's still busy trying to render the screen. 3. Edit Mode - Tab 4. Edit mode is to modify the mesh when you click on the mesh then switch to Edit Mode Note! If you click on the Armature then switch to Edit mode, you will be EDITING THE ARMATURE BONES! <span style="text-decoration:underline;">For this crash course, you will not be messing with the Edit Object Mode or the Armature Edit mode.</span> 4. Pose Mode - Ctrl + Tab 5. Armature Overview*When going into Pose Mode, to save your CPU and GPU some processing power, you must First Change the Viewport mode to Viewport Shading then click the small “V” and select Lighting leave as Studio and for Color change it to “Texture” <p id="gdcalert3" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image3.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert4">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image3.png "image_tooltip") Figure Lesson 1 - 2.1 6. 5. Shader / Material Properties 7. Overview 7. Nodes 8. Textures 9. UV Maps 10. 6. 5. ## <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 3. Models & Rig used in this Tutorial </span> 1. BG3 Rigs / Models used in this tutorial Shadowheart by bobot from smutbase ( Used in Lesson 3 and 4) Link : [https://smutba.se/project/37102/](https://smutba.se/project/37102/) Orin the Red by bobot from smutbase ( Not used in Tutorial, but Explained) Link : [https://smutba.se/project/38182/](https://smutba.se/project/38182/) Kobold by SamagthraV2 from Open3DLab (Lesson 2) Link : [https://open3dlab.com/project/36936/](https://open3dlab.com/project/36936/) 2. Model Overview (Armatures, Rigs, etc) 1. We will go over the basics of each of the models in this tutorial and along the way provide terms and definitions of each of the components used within Blender. 2. An “**Armature**” is a type of object used for rigging, basically a skeleton. Armatures borrow the same structure (bones) from real-world skeletons. 3. A rig is the controls and strings that move a marionette (puppet). The Main takeaway is that Armature are more difficult to pose as compared to a fully controlled rigged character. The reason for this is because it lacks any IK / FK controls. So if you move the Hand, the rest of the arm and shoulder will not move. You will have to pose from the base bone in the chain. ( explain more later on) 1. This is an Armature : 1. <p id="gdcalert4" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image4.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert5">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image4.png "image_tooltip") This is a Rig: 2. <p id="gdcalert5" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image5.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert6">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image5.png "image_tooltip") 4. The Shadowheart body rig is a standard human rig equipped with "Rig Controllers." The main armature is entirely hidden, allowing for model posing exclusively through the rig controllers. 3. IK & FK Controls Rigged Characters will feature a lot of additional features such as IK & FK Kinematics to allow you to make movements akin to real world movements. IK stands for Inverse Kinematics, and FK stands for Forward Kinematics. Both are rig systems used to control characters or objects in animation, making the process more manageable and offering better control. **Differences and Uses**: FK operates on a chain system where moving a "parent" bone affects all connected "child" bones, ideal for sequential movement like swinging arms. IK, conversely, allows for moving a "child" bone to adjust the position of all parent bones up the chain, useful for precise end-point movements like positioning a hand. **When to Use Each System:** Typically, IK is used for parts that need to be positioned precisely, like feet that must stay planted on the ground, while FK is preferred for upper body movements unless interacting with objects. **Switching Between IK and FK:** Animators often switch between IK and FK to achieve the desired animation effect, such as during interactions with objects or dynamic movements, with rigs usually featuring built-in controllers for this purpose. _If you ever need a quick refresher, _ _The following video explains briefly the differences between IK & FK Kinematics._ [https://youtu.be/nGd7NlrT310?si=tR7PeaHe83GT71dR](https://youtu.be/nGd7NlrT310?si=tR7PeaHe83GT71dR) This is how IK in Pose Mode Blender looks like. [https://youtu.be/cZXPObAzGxE](https://youtu.be/cZXPObAzGxE) @https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cZXPObAzGxE When I grab the IK Hand control, the shoulder and the elbow follow the movements of the IK Hand control as IK controls are at the end of the bone chain. 2. Clothing Armatures 3. To Access the Armature for the following clothing, select the main rig 4. <p id="gdcalert6" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image6.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert7">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image6.png "image_tooltip") 3. Armature Bones for Blue Outfit - (Wave Queen) 4. <p id="gdcalert7" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image7.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert8">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image7.png "image_tooltip") 5. Armature Bones for White Outfit - Daisy Dress 6. <p id="gdcalert8" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image8.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert9">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image8.png "image_tooltip") 5. Orin the Red ( Used in Lesson 3 ) 5. Overview 6. Kobold ( Used in Lesson 2 ) 6. Overview 4. _What about Nyl’s BG3 Model ? _(Intermediate) 7. Nyl’s BG3 Model will be used in Lesson 4 where we will combine all the lessons learned from this tutorial. ## <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 4. Blender UI Overview used in this tutorial</span> 1. ViewPort Mode. ( 1. TimeLine 2. Text 3. 2. The Shader Editor The Shader Editor is used to edit materials which are used for rendering. Materials used by Cycles and Eevee are defined using a node tree. Therefore, the main window of the Shader editor is a node editor. <p id="gdcalert9" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image9.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert10">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image9.png "image_tooltip") The Options panel in the Sidebar region contains the same settings that are also available in the Material tab in the Properties. They differ depending on the selected render engine. The settings are duplicated to make it possible to edit the entire material from the Shader editor. 3. 4. Creating a Pose 4. Pose Library 5. Camera Settings 1. 2. Creating an Animation 6. Camera Settings 3. Parenting Camera to Empty - Camera Dolly 5. Adding Scene Lighting 7. HDRI HDRIs are a 360 image with light data recorded in them, it will affect the entire blender environment for that scene. Think of it as “world lighting” which is how blender describes it 8. Emission Shader The emission shader is within the materials properties tab and this controls the amount of “glow” a particular material has. This is useful in making armor or small details glow, depending on the emission color it will glow that color, the stronger the emission value is the more glowy it will be and area it will cover. 6. Compositor Tab This is more like the Post Processing “Lightroom” once everything is done, you can add cinematic lighting nodes, color grading , etc but without modifying the objects themselves just on what the camera will see in the final render, for example, making a scene monochromatic will make everything black and white. ## <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 5. Exporting</span> {#chapter-5-exporting} 1. Eevee 2. Cycles 3. Images 1. PNG 2. Videos 3. Filename Workflow 4. Post-Processing ## The Kobold Tutorial 1. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Lesson 2 - The Kobold Tutorial</span> 1. Chapter 1. Creating your first Render Scene 1. Render settings 2. Viewport 3. Review Addons 4. Camera Setup 2. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 2. Importing / Appending</span> 5. BlenderKit - 6. Open3DLab - 7. Polygon - HDRI 8. Sketchfab - 3. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 3. Setting up your scene</span> 9. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 4. Pose Mode</span> 10. Armatures with Control Rigs 1. IK & FK Controls 11. Armatures without Control Rigs 2. Manually posing without FK / IK Controls 3. 4. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 5. Rig Basics</span> ## Animation 1. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Lesson 3 - Animation</span> 1. Chapter 1. Animation Panels Overview The work flow I use consists of reference video, blocking out stages, in-betweens, cleaning up, camera tracking. 12 FPS in blender / export at 24 FPS I set the timeline into frames not timecode Create a block animation action, then send it to action editor Block out your poses, then saved them to the Pose Library When cleaning up, check for interpolation and key-smoothing. (think squash and stretch) Scene Lighting - i start with the standard 3-point lighting then pivot from there. Camera tracking - i place one camera on the Y axis and one on the X axis and 3rd in between the two. 1. Action Editor 2. Once you have recorded an animation on the timeline, you will want to create more animations, this is where the action editor is used. 3. Each animation will be labeled as an action. And you then can combine multiple actions. For example, a running action, then add a jumping action. Then a dancing action. 4. NLA Editor + Animation Layers - ( Non-Linear Action Editor ) 5. This is where the magic happens, in the NLA Editor you then can combine multiple actions. For example, a running action, then add a jumping action. Then a dancing action. Blender can do an “OK” job with merging them but this is where “Animation Layers” addon shines. As it gives you more freedom to switch between animations in the same armature and retains the base pose animation but without going to shit. 6. For Example - You have your character walking towards another but you want to add a head movement of them looking up and down and giving a smile. With the Animation layers, you just add another layer and then edit the head movements, then add the face shape keys layer, and the addon will merge all those separate animations together seamlessly. 2. Addons 7. Using AutoRigPro 8. Overview 9. SmartRig 10. ARP Remapping 3. Mixamo Animations 4. Rokoko Live 2. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 2. Importing Animation</span> 11. Not looking forward to this, this is the most painful process. 12. **_<span style="text-decoration:underline;">Motion capture is not perfect</span>_** 13. Mixamo 14. Rokoko 5. 3. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 3. Animating Weapons and Objects</span> 6. Child of Constraints 4. [https://www.pexels.com/photo/woman-in-blue-blazer-in-the-fitting-room-8307706/](https://www.pexels.com/photo/woman-in-blue-blazer-in-the-fitting-room-8307706/) 5. 76ca398986cf75e17ade8c11b04462427f3dedf8 13 12 2024-02-24T00:49:42Z Kuwelsco 2 wikitext text/x-wiki Hello! This requires some slight awareness of Blender. - Please Click on the Welcome to begin! ## Welcome! {#welcome} Basic Navigation - the Sidebar on the Left is the Chapter Outline, the Table of Contents below is the Sections and Lessons I set this layout this way so if you are having problems, you can easily refer to the Lesson Number and provide assistance if needed. 🚨🚨🚨Disclaimer🚨🚨🚨🚨 🚨🚨I’m not a fan of hardcore lewd stuff🚨🚨 Simple way to vibe check, is to use the _“Game of Thrones Test”_ (the TV show not the book! 😂) If anything is more spicy than what was shown on Game of Thrones then all that I ask is to please blur it out before asking for help. Lastly, NO DISSING KOBOLDS 😂or at least just not Popper The Businesslord ### _<span style="text-decoration:underline;">“So whats the goal of this Tutorial ?”</span>_ {#“so-whats-the-goal-of-this-tutorial-”} To help users to be more familiar with Blender and remove the harsh learning curve. I learned Blender from using FFXIV Game Models, So I strongly feel that by using content you are familiar with, that will also give you that extra motivation finishing your goal in learning Blender. This is also a way to further improve my own skills in Blender. To quote [Jim Kwik :](https://www.jimkwik.com/podcasts/kwik-brain-001-learning-anything-faster) * _If you want to cut your learning curve in half, learn with the intention of teaching it to somebody else._ * _If you had to give a presentation on what you’re learning today, you would learn it differently. You would pay closer attention. You would take more detailed notes. You would ask better questions._ * _When you teach something, You get to learn it twice._ ### _<span style="text-decoration:underline;">“Ok. So what will I learn in this tutorial?”</span>_ {#“ok-so-what-will-i-learn-in-this-tutorial-”} Able to use the Nyls Model and any other model from Open3DLab/Smutbase/Etc You would learn to pose your own scene render in Eevee similar to this Popper the Kobold here. <p id="gdcalert1" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image1.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert2">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image1.png "image_tooltip") Example 2 ### _<span style="text-decoration:underline;">“Sold! What Do I need to do?”</span>_ {#“sold-what-do-i-need-to-do-”} ## Chapter 1. Getting Started - Intro ### Blender 3.6 LTS {#blender-3-6-lts} **Please use Blender 3.6 LTS** Yes, there is Blender 4 out but 3.6 has the most addon compatibility at the moment. The goal of this tutorial is to simplify the learning curve of making simple animations in Blender using the BG3 characters, now yes there are a lot of shortcuts used here. Some addons will cost money or have free versions to use. Again these are the tools I currently use to make poses and animations. Yes, This is a very niche tutorial and straight to the point. You will not be using any paid add on until **Lesson 3 - Animation.** I did this to help everyone not feel pressured into buying anything until you feel more comfortable using Blender prior to making that leap into paid addons. So again please don't rush out and buy any addons. 1. **Addons** Blender has support for many awesome addons both internally that ship with blender and also install user made addons, To enable internal addons you go …. To install an external addon you go to preferences, Addons… Internal Addons - Need to Activate Please enable to following features within blender, Make Camera from View Images as Planes Addons - External 3rd Party : **AutoRigPro - (You won't use it until Lesson 3!)** This being a course for a very specific goal, the models you will use are already rigged and weighted, posed, etc. So for the first 2 lessons we will not be using AutorigPro, also to avoid information overload. The only feature being used by AutoRigPro will be the “Remapping” which is transferring the animation from one (mixamo) armatures to another in this case being your BG3 model used in this tutorial. 👏 Ahem 👏this👏is 👏a 👏huge👏time👏saver!👏 Cost :** $40 (Full) Auto-Rig Pro + Smart + Remap + Fbx Export** Link : [https://blendermarket.com/products/auto-rig-pro](https://blendermarket.com/products/auto-rig-pro) Free Version - NO **Animation Layers**. **(You won't use it until Lesson 3!)** This is to simplify the NLA Editing animation and to make it more user friendly and forgiving when combining multiple animations, plus it has a lot of features that really make the NLA editor less intimidating. 👏 Ahem 👏this👏is 👏a 👏huge👏time👏saver!👏 _Link - Price_ _Free Version - Yes_ **Polygon ( Used in Lesson 2 )** This addon is just an asset library from the Polygon site, we will be using it to import HDRIs to adjust the lighting and again make it easier for the sole purpose of our renders. **Free**! ( Optional! ) **Photographer 5 - ** ## <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 2. Basic UI Setup Workflow</span> 1. Blender Layout 1. Quick Favorites Menu - “Q” button <p id="gdcalert2" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image2.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert3">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image2.png "image_tooltip") The Q button will be your best friend, you will map a lot of repeatable actions to the Q key, you can add actions by selecting over and right clicking “Add to Quick Favorites”. Your Quick Favorites are mode specific, so each mode will have a list of quick favorites, you will just need to re-add your quick actions within each mode. **Please Bind the Following Commands to your Quick Favorites :** 1. Walk Navigation #### This will enable you to use your “WASD” keys to move around the blender viewport space. You need to set up for each mode, (Object Mode, Edit Mode and Pose Mode). 2. Render Settings 2. Eevee 1. More faster less detail - Turn on bloom, motion blur, simply normals 3. Cycles 2. More GPU intensive longer rendering times - Ray Tracing Engine 4. View Porting Settings 3. For Eevee set to textured mode 4. For Cycle set the Viewport render down to 16 to 32 2. The Viewport 3. Object Mode - Tab 5. This is your default viewport, it mostly looks at the mesh and environment, it looks all nice and pretty. Which is awful for animating, because majority of your time will be in Pose Mode, 6. Yes the model will look ugly and the colors doodoo flat but you don't need your GPU stalling out when you are trying to pose and it's still busy trying to render the screen. 3. Edit Mode - Tab 4. Edit mode is to modify the mesh when you click on the mesh then switch to Edit Mode Note! If you click on the Armature then switch to Edit mode, you will be EDITING THE ARMATURE BONES! <span style="text-decoration:underline;">For this crash course, you will not be messing with the Edit Object Mode or the Armature Edit mode.</span> 4. Pose Mode - Ctrl + Tab 5. Armature Overview*When going into Pose Mode, to save your CPU and GPU some processing power, you must First Change the Viewport mode to Viewport Shading then click the small “V” and select Lighting leave as Studio and for Color change it to “Texture” <p id="gdcalert3" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image3.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert4">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image3.png "image_tooltip") Figure Lesson 1 - 2.1 6. 5. Shader / Material Properties 7. Overview 7. Nodes 8. Textures 9. UV Maps 10. 6. 5. ## <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 3. Models & Rig used in this Tutorial </span> 1. BG3 Rigs / Models used in this tutorial Shadowheart by bobot from smutbase ( Used in Lesson 3 and 4) Link : [https://smutba.se/project/37102/](https://smutba.se/project/37102/) Orin the Red by bobot from smutbase ( Not used in Tutorial, but Explained) Link : [https://smutba.se/project/38182/](https://smutba.se/project/38182/) Kobold by SamagthraV2 from Open3DLab (Lesson 2) Link : [https://open3dlab.com/project/36936/](https://open3dlab.com/project/36936/) 2. Model Overview (Armatures, Rigs, etc) 1. We will go over the basics of each of the models in this tutorial and along the way provide terms and definitions of each of the components used within Blender. 2. An “**Armature**” is a type of object used for rigging, basically a skeleton. Armatures borrow the same structure (bones) from real-world skeletons. 3. A rig is the controls and strings that move a marionette (puppet). The Main takeaway is that Armature are more difficult to pose as compared to a fully controlled rigged character. The reason for this is because it lacks any IK / FK controls. So if you move the Hand, the rest of the arm and shoulder will not move. You will have to pose from the base bone in the chain. ( explain more later on) 1. This is an Armature : 1. <p id="gdcalert4" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image4.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert5">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image4.png "image_tooltip") This is a Rig: 2. <p id="gdcalert5" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image5.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert6">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image5.png "image_tooltip") 4. The Shadowheart body rig is a standard human rig equipped with "Rig Controllers." The main armature is entirely hidden, allowing for model posing exclusively through the rig controllers. 3. IK & FK Controls Rigged Characters will feature a lot of additional features such as IK & FK Kinematics to allow you to make movements akin to real world movements. IK stands for Inverse Kinematics, and FK stands for Forward Kinematics. Both are rig systems used to control characters or objects in animation, making the process more manageable and offering better control. **Differences and Uses**: FK operates on a chain system where moving a "parent" bone affects all connected "child" bones, ideal for sequential movement like swinging arms. IK, conversely, allows for moving a "child" bone to adjust the position of all parent bones up the chain, useful for precise end-point movements like positioning a hand. **When to Use Each System:** Typically, IK is used for parts that need to be positioned precisely, like feet that must stay planted on the ground, while FK is preferred for upper body movements unless interacting with objects. **Switching Between IK and FK:** Animators often switch between IK and FK to achieve the desired animation effect, such as during interactions with objects or dynamic movements, with rigs usually featuring built-in controllers for this purpose. _If you ever need a quick refresher, _ _The following video explains briefly the differences between IK & FK Kinematics._ [https://youtu.be/nGd7NlrT310?si=tR7PeaHe83GT71dR](https://youtu.be/nGd7NlrT310?si=tR7PeaHe83GT71dR) This is how IK in Pose Mode Blender looks like. [https://youtu.be/cZXPObAzGxE](https://youtu.be/cZXPObAzGxE) @https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cZXPObAzGxE When I grab the IK Hand control, the shoulder and the elbow follow the movements of the IK Hand control as IK controls are at the end of the bone chain. 2. Clothing Armatures 3. To Access the Armature for the following clothing, select the main rig 4. <p id="gdcalert6" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image6.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert7">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image6.png "image_tooltip") 3. Armature Bones for Blue Outfit - (Wave Queen) 4. <p id="gdcalert7" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image7.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert8">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image7.png "image_tooltip") 5. Armature Bones for White Outfit - Daisy Dress 6. <p id="gdcalert8" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image8.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert9">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image8.png "image_tooltip") 5. Orin the Red ( Used in Lesson 3 ) 5. Overview 6. Kobold ( Used in Lesson 2 ) 6. Overview 4. _What about Nyl’s BG3 Model ? _(Intermediate) 7. Nyl’s BG3 Model will be used in Lesson 4 where we will combine all the lessons learned from this tutorial. ## <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 4. Blender UI Overview used in this tutorial</span> 1. ViewPort Mode. ( 1. TimeLine 2. Text 3. 2. The Shader Editor The Shader Editor is used to edit materials which are used for rendering. Materials used by Cycles and Eevee are defined using a node tree. Therefore, the main window of the Shader editor is a node editor. <p id="gdcalert9" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image9.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert10">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image9.png "image_tooltip") The Options panel in the Sidebar region contains the same settings that are also available in the Material tab in the Properties. They differ depending on the selected render engine. The settings are duplicated to make it possible to edit the entire material from the Shader editor. 3. 4. Creating a Pose 4. Pose Library 5. Camera Settings 1. 2. Creating an Animation 6. Camera Settings 3. Parenting Camera to Empty - Camera Dolly 5. Adding Scene Lighting 7. HDRI HDRIs are a 360 image with light data recorded in them, it will affect the entire blender environment for that scene. Think of it as “world lighting” which is how blender describes it 8. Emission Shader The emission shader is within the materials properties tab and this controls the amount of “glow” a particular material has. This is useful in making armor or small details glow, depending on the emission color it will glow that color, the stronger the emission value is the more glowy it will be and area it will cover. 6. Compositor Tab This is more like the Post Processing “Lightroom” once everything is done, you can add cinematic lighting nodes, color grading , etc but without modifying the objects themselves just on what the camera will see in the final render, for example, making a scene monochromatic will make everything black and white. ## <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 5. Exporting</span> {#chapter-5-exporting} 1. Eevee 2. Cycles 3. Images 1. PNG 2. Videos 3. Filename Workflow 4. Post-Processing ## The Kobold Tutorial 1. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Lesson 2 - The Kobold Tutorial</span> 1. Chapter 1. Creating your first Render Scene 1. Render settings 2. Viewport 3. Review Addons 4. Camera Setup 2. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 2. Importing / Appending</span> 5. BlenderKit - 6. Open3DLab - 7. Polygon - HDRI 8. Sketchfab - 3. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 3. Setting up your scene</span> 9. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 4. Pose Mode</span> 10. Armatures with Control Rigs 1. IK & FK Controls 11. Armatures without Control Rigs 2. Manually posing without FK / IK Controls 3. 4. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 5. Rig Basics</span> ## Animation 1. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Lesson 3 - Animation</span> 1. Chapter 1. Animation Panels Overview The work flow I use consists of reference video, blocking out stages, in-betweens, cleaning up, camera tracking. 12 FPS in blender / export at 24 FPS I set the timeline into frames not timecode Create a block animation action, then send it to action editor Block out your poses, then saved them to the Pose Library When cleaning up, check for interpolation and key-smoothing. (think squash and stretch) Scene Lighting - i start with the standard 3-point lighting then pivot from there. Camera tracking - i place one camera on the Y axis and one on the X axis and 3rd in between the two. 1. Action Editor 2. Once you have recorded an animation on the timeline, you will want to create more animations, this is where the action editor is used. 3. Each animation will be labeled as an action. And you then can combine multiple actions. For example, a running action, then add a jumping action. Then a dancing action. 4. NLA Editor + Animation Layers - ( Non-Linear Action Editor ) 5. This is where the magic happens, in the NLA Editor you then can combine multiple actions. For example, a running action, then add a jumping action. Then a dancing action. Blender can do an “OK” job with merging them but this is where “Animation Layers” addon shines. As it gives you more freedom to switch between animations in the same armature and retains the base pose animation but without going to shit. 6. For Example - You have your character walking towards another but you want to add a head movement of them looking up and down and giving a smile. With the Animation layers, you just add another layer and then edit the head movements, then add the face shape keys layer, and the addon will merge all those separate animations together seamlessly. 2. Addons 7. Using AutoRigPro 8. Overview 9. SmartRig 10. ARP Remapping 3. Mixamo Animations 4. Rokoko Live 2. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 2. Importing Animation</span> 11. Not looking forward to this, this is the most painful process. 12. **_<span style="text-decoration:underline;">Motion capture is not perfect</span>_** 13. Mixamo 14. Rokoko 5. 3. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 3. Animating Weapons and Objects</span> 6. Child of Constraints 4. [https://www.pexels.com/photo/woman-in-blue-blazer-in-the-fitting-room-8307706/](https://www.pexels.com/photo/woman-in-blue-blazer-in-the-fitting-room-8307706/) 5. 46335751bcac940cde2361fa6bd2daef254e717b 14 13 2024-02-24T00:52:41Z Kuwelsco 2 wikitext text/x-wiki Hello! This requires some slight awareness of Blender. - Please Click on the Welcome to begin! ## Welcome! {#welcome} Basic Navigation - the Sidebar on the Left is the Chapter Outline, the Table of Contents below is the Sections and Lessons I set this layout this way so if you are having problems, you can easily refer to the Lesson Number and provide assistance if needed. 🚨🚨🚨Disclaimer🚨🚨🚨🚨 🚨🚨I’m not a fan of hardcore lewd stuff🚨🚨 Simple way to vibe check, is to use the _“Game of Thrones Test”_ (the TV show not the book! 😂) If anything is more spicy than what was shown on Game of Thrones then all that I ask is to please blur it out before asking for help. Lastly, NO DISSING KOBOLDS 😂or at least just not Popper The Businesslord ### _<span style="text-decoration:underline;">“So whats the goal of this Tutorial ?”</span>_ {#“so-whats-the-goal-of-this-tutorial-”} To help users to be more familiar with Blender and remove the harsh learning curve. I learned Blender from using FFXIV Game Models, So I strongly feel that by using content you are familiar with, that will also give you that extra motivation finishing your goal in learning Blender. This is also a way to further improve my own skills in Blender. To quote [Jim Kwik :](https://www.jimkwik.com/podcasts/kwik-brain-001-learning-anything-faster) * _If you want to cut your learning curve in half, learn with the intention of teaching it to somebody else._ * _If you had to give a presentation on what you’re learning today, you would learn it differently. You would pay closer attention. You would take more detailed notes. You would ask better questions._ * _When you teach something, You get to learn it twice._ ### _<span style="text-decoration:underline;">“Ok. So what will I learn in this tutorial?”</span>_ {#“ok-so-what-will-i-learn-in-this-tutorial-”} Able to use the Nyls Model and any other model from Open3DLab/Smutbase/Etc You would learn to pose your own scene render in Eevee similar to this Popper the Kobold here. <p id="gdcalert1" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image1.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert2">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image1.png "image_tooltip") Example 2 ### _<span style="text-decoration:underline;">“Sold! What Do I need to do?”</span>_ {#“sold-what-do-i-need-to-do-”} ## Chapter 1. Getting Started - Intro ### Blender 3.6 LTS {#blender-3-6-lts} **Please use Blender 3.6 LTS** Yes, there is Blender 4 out but 3.6 has the most addon compatibility at the moment. The goal of this tutorial is to simplify the learning curve of making simple animations in Blender using the BG3 characters, now yes there are a lot of shortcuts used here. Some addons will cost money or have free versions to use. Again these are the tools I currently use to make poses and animations. Yes, This is a very niche tutorial and straight to the point. You will not be using any paid add on until **Lesson 3 - Animation.** I did this to help everyone not feel pressured into buying anything until you feel more comfortable using Blender prior to making that leap into paid addons. So again please don't rush out and buy any addons. 1. **Addons** Blender has support for many awesome addons both internally that ship with blender and also install user made addons, To enable internal addons you go …. To install an external addon you go to preferences, Addons… Internal Addons - Need to Activate Please enable to following features within blender, Make Camera from View Images as Planes Addons - External 3rd Party : **AutoRigPro - (You won't use it until Lesson 3!)** This being a course for a very specific goal, the models you will use are already rigged and weighted, posed, etc. So for the first 2 lessons we will not be using AutorigPro, also to avoid information overload. The only feature being used by AutoRigPro will be the “Remapping” which is transferring the animation from one (mixamo) armatures to another in this case being your BG3 model used in this tutorial. 👏 Ahem 👏this👏is 👏a 👏huge👏time👏saver!👏 Cost :** $40 (Full) Auto-Rig Pro + Smart + Remap + Fbx Export** Link : [https://blendermarket.com/products/auto-rig-pro](https://blendermarket.com/products/auto-rig-pro) Free Version - NO **Animation Layers**. **(You won't use it until Lesson 3!)** This is to simplify the NLA Editing animation and to make it more user friendly and forgiving when combining multiple animations, plus it has a lot of features that really make the NLA editor less intimidating. 👏 Ahem 👏this👏is 👏a 👏huge👏time👏saver!👏 _Link - Price_ _Free Version - Yes_ **Polygon ( Used in Lesson 2 )** This addon is just an asset library from the Polygon site, we will be using it to import HDRIs to adjust the lighting and again make it easier for the sole purpose of our renders. **Free**! ( Optional! ) **Photographer 5 - ** ## <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 2. Basic UI Setup Workflow</span> [[Blender Layout]] 5. Shader / Material Properties 7. Overview 7. Nodes 8. Textures 9. UV Maps 10. 6. 5. ## <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 3. Models & Rig used in this Tutorial </span> 1. BG3 Rigs / Models used in this tutorial Shadowheart by bobot from smutbase ( Used in Lesson 3 and 4) Link : [https://smutba.se/project/37102/](https://smutba.se/project/37102/) Orin the Red by bobot from smutbase ( Not used in Tutorial, but Explained) Link : [https://smutba.se/project/38182/](https://smutba.se/project/38182/) Kobold by SamagthraV2 from Open3DLab (Lesson 2) Link : [https://open3dlab.com/project/36936/](https://open3dlab.com/project/36936/) 2. Model Overview (Armatures, Rigs, etc) 1. We will go over the basics of each of the models in this tutorial and along the way provide terms and definitions of each of the components used within Blender. 2. An “**Armature**” is a type of object used for rigging, basically a skeleton. Armatures borrow the same structure (bones) from real-world skeletons. 3. A rig is the controls and strings that move a marionette (puppet). The Main takeaway is that Armature are more difficult to pose as compared to a fully controlled rigged character. The reason for this is because it lacks any IK / FK controls. So if you move the Hand, the rest of the arm and shoulder will not move. You will have to pose from the base bone in the chain. ( explain more later on) 1. This is an Armature : 1. <p id="gdcalert4" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image4.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert5">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image4.png "image_tooltip") This is a Rig: 2. <p id="gdcalert5" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image5.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert6">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image5.png "image_tooltip") 4. The Shadowheart body rig is a standard human rig equipped with "Rig Controllers." The main armature is entirely hidden, allowing for model posing exclusively through the rig controllers. 3. IK & FK Controls Rigged Characters will feature a lot of additional features such as IK & FK Kinematics to allow you to make movements akin to real world movements. IK stands for Inverse Kinematics, and FK stands for Forward Kinematics. Both are rig systems used to control characters or objects in animation, making the process more manageable and offering better control. **Differences and Uses**: FK operates on a chain system where moving a "parent" bone affects all connected "child" bones, ideal for sequential movement like swinging arms. IK, conversely, allows for moving a "child" bone to adjust the position of all parent bones up the chain, useful for precise end-point movements like positioning a hand. **When to Use Each System:** Typically, IK is used for parts that need to be positioned precisely, like feet that must stay planted on the ground, while FK is preferred for upper body movements unless interacting with objects. **Switching Between IK and FK:** Animators often switch between IK and FK to achieve the desired animation effect, such as during interactions with objects or dynamic movements, with rigs usually featuring built-in controllers for this purpose. _If you ever need a quick refresher, _ _The following video explains briefly the differences between IK & FK Kinematics._ [https://youtu.be/nGd7NlrT310?si=tR7PeaHe83GT71dR](https://youtu.be/nGd7NlrT310?si=tR7PeaHe83GT71dR) This is how IK in Pose Mode Blender looks like. [https://youtu.be/cZXPObAzGxE](https://youtu.be/cZXPObAzGxE) @https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cZXPObAzGxE When I grab the IK Hand control, the shoulder and the elbow follow the movements of the IK Hand control as IK controls are at the end of the bone chain. 2. Clothing Armatures 3. To Access the Armature for the following clothing, select the main rig 4. <p id="gdcalert6" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image6.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert7">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image6.png "image_tooltip") 3. Armature Bones for Blue Outfit - (Wave Queen) 4. <p id="gdcalert7" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image7.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert8">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image7.png "image_tooltip") 5. Armature Bones for White Outfit - Daisy Dress 6. <p id="gdcalert8" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image8.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert9">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image8.png "image_tooltip") 5. Orin the Red ( Used in Lesson 3 ) 5. Overview 6. Kobold ( Used in Lesson 2 ) 6. Overview 4. _What about Nyl’s BG3 Model ? _(Intermediate) 7. Nyl’s BG3 Model will be used in Lesson 4 where we will combine all the lessons learned from this tutorial. ## <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 4. Blender UI Overview used in this tutorial</span> 1. ViewPort Mode. ( 1. TimeLine 2. Text 3. 2. The Shader Editor The Shader Editor is used to edit materials which are used for rendering. Materials used by Cycles and Eevee are defined using a node tree. Therefore, the main window of the Shader editor is a node editor. <p id="gdcalert9" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image9.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert10">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image9.png "image_tooltip") The Options panel in the Sidebar region contains the same settings that are also available in the Material tab in the Properties. They differ depending on the selected render engine. The settings are duplicated to make it possible to edit the entire material from the Shader editor. 3. 4. Creating a Pose 4. Pose Library 5. Camera Settings 1. 2. Creating an Animation 6. Camera Settings 3. Parenting Camera to Empty - Camera Dolly 5. Adding Scene Lighting 7. HDRI HDRIs are a 360 image with light data recorded in them, it will affect the entire blender environment for that scene. Think of it as “world lighting” which is how blender describes it 8. Emission Shader The emission shader is within the materials properties tab and this controls the amount of “glow” a particular material has. This is useful in making armor or small details glow, depending on the emission color it will glow that color, the stronger the emission value is the more glowy it will be and area it will cover. 6. Compositor Tab This is more like the Post Processing “Lightroom” once everything is done, you can add cinematic lighting nodes, color grading , etc but without modifying the objects themselves just on what the camera will see in the final render, for example, making a scene monochromatic will make everything black and white. ## <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 5. Exporting</span> {#chapter-5-exporting} 1. Eevee 2. Cycles 3. Images 1. PNG 2. Videos 3. Filename Workflow 4. Post-Processing ## The Kobold Tutorial 1. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Lesson 2 - The Kobold Tutorial</span> 1. Chapter 1. Creating your first Render Scene 1. Render settings 2. Viewport 3. Review Addons 4. Camera Setup 2. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 2. Importing / Appending</span> 5. BlenderKit - 6. Open3DLab - 7. Polygon - HDRI 8. Sketchfab - 3. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 3. Setting up your scene</span> 9. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 4. Pose Mode</span> 10. Armatures with Control Rigs 1. IK & FK Controls 11. Armatures without Control Rigs 2. Manually posing without FK / IK Controls 3. 4. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 5. Rig Basics</span> ## Animation 1. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Lesson 3 - Animation</span> 1. Chapter 1. Animation Panels Overview The work flow I use consists of reference video, blocking out stages, in-betweens, cleaning up, camera tracking. 12 FPS in blender / export at 24 FPS I set the timeline into frames not timecode Create a block animation action, then send it to action editor Block out your poses, then saved them to the Pose Library When cleaning up, check for interpolation and key-smoothing. (think squash and stretch) Scene Lighting - i start with the standard 3-point lighting then pivot from there. Camera tracking - i place one camera on the Y axis and one on the X axis and 3rd in between the two. 1. Action Editor 2. Once you have recorded an animation on the timeline, you will want to create more animations, this is where the action editor is used. 3. Each animation will be labeled as an action. And you then can combine multiple actions. For example, a running action, then add a jumping action. Then a dancing action. 4. NLA Editor + Animation Layers - ( Non-Linear Action Editor ) 5. This is where the magic happens, in the NLA Editor you then can combine multiple actions. For example, a running action, then add a jumping action. Then a dancing action. Blender can do an “OK” job with merging them but this is where “Animation Layers” addon shines. As it gives you more freedom to switch between animations in the same armature and retains the base pose animation but without going to shit. 6. For Example - You have your character walking towards another but you want to add a head movement of them looking up and down and giving a smile. With the Animation layers, you just add another layer and then edit the head movements, then add the face shape keys layer, and the addon will merge all those separate animations together seamlessly. 2. Addons 7. Using AutoRigPro 8. Overview 9. SmartRig 10. ARP Remapping 3. Mixamo Animations 4. Rokoko Live 2. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 2. Importing Animation</span> 11. Not looking forward to this, this is the most painful process. 12. **_<span style="text-decoration:underline;">Motion capture is not perfect</span>_** 13. Mixamo 14. Rokoko 5. 3. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 3. Animating Weapons and Objects</span> 6. Child of Constraints 4. [https://www.pexels.com/photo/woman-in-blue-blazer-in-the-fitting-room-8307706/](https://www.pexels.com/photo/woman-in-blue-blazer-in-the-fitting-room-8307706/) 5. 27a64e34675f0729a2ac410b5c4bc34b0bec0b42 17 14 2024-02-24T01:14:56Z Kuwelsco 2 wikitext text/x-wiki Hello! This requires some slight awareness of Blender. Basic Navigation - the Sidebar on the Left is the Chapter Outline, the Table of Contents below is the Sections and Lessons I set this layout this way so if you are having problems, you can easily refer to the Lesson Number and provide assistance if needed. 🚨🚨🚨Disclaimer🚨🚨🚨🚨 🚨🚨I’m not a fan of hardcore lewd stuff🚨🚨 Simple way to vibe check, is to use the _“Game of Thrones Test”_ (the TV show not the book! 😂) If anything is more spicy than what was shown on Game of Thrones then all that I ask is to please blur it out before asking for help. Lastly, NO DISSING KOBOLDS 😂or at least just not Popper The Businesslord ### _<span style="text-decoration:underline;">“So whats the goal of this Tutorial ?”</span>_ {#“so-whats-the-goal-of-this-tutorial-”} To help users to be more familiar with Blender and remove the harsh learning curve. I learned Blender from using FFXIV Game Models, So I strongly feel that by using content you are familiar with, that will also give you that extra motivation finishing your goal in learning Blender. This is also a way to further improve my own skills in Blender. To quote [Jim Kwik :](https://www.jimkwik.com/podcasts/kwik-brain-001-learning-anything-faster) * _If you want to cut your learning curve in half, learn with the intention of teaching it to somebody else._ * _If you had to give a presentation on what you’re learning today, you would learn it differently. You would pay closer attention. You would take more detailed notes. You would ask better questions._ * _When you teach something, You get to learn it twice._ ### _<span style="text-decoration:underline;">“Ok. So what will I learn in this tutorial?”</span>_ {#“ok-so-what-will-i-learn-in-this-tutorial-”} Able to use the Nyls Model and any other model from Open3DLab/Smutbase/Etc You would learn to pose your own scene render in Eevee similar to this Popper the Kobold here. <p id="gdcalert1" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image1.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert2">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image1.png "image_tooltip") Example 2 ### _<span style="text-decoration:underline;">“Sold! What Do I need to do?”</span>_ {#“sold-what-do-i-need-to-do-”} ## Chapter 1. Getting Started - Intro ### Blender 3.6 LTS {#blender-3-6-lts} **Please use Blender 3.6 LTS** Yes, there is Blender 4 out but 3.6 has the most addon compatibility at the moment. The goal of this tutorial is to simplify the learning curve of making simple animations in Blender using the BG3 characters, now yes there are a lot of shortcuts used here. Some addons will cost money or have free versions to use. Again these are the tools I currently use to make poses and animations. Yes, This is a very niche tutorial and straight to the point. You will not be using any paid add on until **Lesson 3 - Animation.** I did this to help everyone not feel pressured into buying anything until you feel more comfortable using Blender prior to making that leap into paid addons. So again please don't rush out and buy any addons. 1. **Addons** Blender has support for many awesome addons both internally that ship with blender and also install user made addons, To enable internal addons you go …. To install an external addon you go to preferences, Addons… Internal Addons - Need to Activate Please enable to following features within blender, Make Camera from View Images as Planes Addons - External 3rd Party : **AutoRigPro - (You won't use it until Lesson 3!)** This being a course for a very specific goal, the models you will use are already rigged and weighted, posed, etc. So for the first 2 lessons we will not be using AutorigPro, also to avoid information overload. The only feature being used by AutoRigPro will be the “Remapping” which is transferring the animation from one (mixamo) armatures to another in this case being your BG3 model used in this tutorial. 👏 Ahem 👏this👏is 👏a 👏huge👏time👏saver!👏 Cost :** $40 (Full) Auto-Rig Pro + Smart + Remap + Fbx Export** Link : [https://blendermarket.com/products/auto-rig-pro](https://blendermarket.com/products/auto-rig-pro) Free Version - NO **Animation Layers**. **(You won't use it until Lesson 3!)** This is to simplify the NLA Editing animation and to make it more user friendly and forgiving when combining multiple animations, plus it has a lot of features that really make the NLA editor less intimidating. 👏 Ahem 👏this👏is 👏a 👏huge👏time👏saver!👏 _Link - Price_ _Free Version - Yes_ **Polygon ( Used in Lesson 2 )** This addon is just an asset library from the Polygon site, we will be using it to import HDRIs to adjust the lighting and again make it easier for the sole purpose of our renders. **Free**! ( Optional! ) **Photographer 5 - ** ## <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 2. Basic UI Setup Workflow</span> [[Blender Layout]] 5. Shader / Material Properties 7. Overview 7. Nodes 8. Textures 9. UV Maps 10. 6. 5. ## <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 3. Models & Rig used in this Tutorial </span> 1. BG3 Rigs / Models used in this tutorial Shadowheart by bobot from smutbase ( Used in Lesson 3 and 4) Link : [https://smutba.se/project/37102/](https://smutba.se/project/37102/) Orin the Red by bobot from smutbase ( Not used in Tutorial, but Explained) Link : [https://smutba.se/project/38182/](https://smutba.se/project/38182/) Kobold by SamagthraV2 from Open3DLab (Lesson 2) Link : [https://open3dlab.com/project/36936/](https://open3dlab.com/project/36936/) 2. Model Overview (Armatures, Rigs, etc) 1. We will go over the basics of each of the models in this tutorial and along the way provide terms and definitions of each of the components used within Blender. 2. An “**Armature**” is a type of object used for rigging, basically a skeleton. Armatures borrow the same structure (bones) from real-world skeletons. 3. A rig is the controls and strings that move a marionette (puppet). The Main takeaway is that Armature are more difficult to pose as compared to a fully controlled rigged character. The reason for this is because it lacks any IK / FK controls. So if you move the Hand, the rest of the arm and shoulder will not move. You will have to pose from the base bone in the chain. ( explain more later on) 1. This is an Armature : 1. <p id="gdcalert4" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image4.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert5">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image4.png "image_tooltip") This is a Rig: 2. <p id="gdcalert5" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image5.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert6">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image5.png "image_tooltip") 4. The Shadowheart body rig is a standard human rig equipped with "Rig Controllers." The main armature is entirely hidden, allowing for model posing exclusively through the rig controllers. 3. IK & FK Controls Rigged Characters will feature a lot of additional features such as IK & FK Kinematics to allow you to make movements akin to real world movements. IK stands for Inverse Kinematics, and FK stands for Forward Kinematics. Both are rig systems used to control characters or objects in animation, making the process more manageable and offering better control. **Differences and Uses**: FK operates on a chain system where moving a "parent" bone affects all connected "child" bones, ideal for sequential movement like swinging arms. IK, conversely, allows for moving a "child" bone to adjust the position of all parent bones up the chain, useful for precise end-point movements like positioning a hand. **When to Use Each System:** Typically, IK is used for parts that need to be positioned precisely, like feet that must stay planted on the ground, while FK is preferred for upper body movements unless interacting with objects. **Switching Between IK and FK:** Animators often switch between IK and FK to achieve the desired animation effect, such as during interactions with objects or dynamic movements, with rigs usually featuring built-in controllers for this purpose. _If you ever need a quick refresher, _ _The following video explains briefly the differences between IK & FK Kinematics._ [https://youtu.be/nGd7NlrT310?si=tR7PeaHe83GT71dR](https://youtu.be/nGd7NlrT310?si=tR7PeaHe83GT71dR) This is how IK in Pose Mode Blender looks like. [https://youtu.be/cZXPObAzGxE](https://youtu.be/cZXPObAzGxE) @https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cZXPObAzGxE When I grab the IK Hand control, the shoulder and the elbow follow the movements of the IK Hand control as IK controls are at the end of the bone chain. 2. Clothing Armatures 3. To Access the Armature for the following clothing, select the main rig 4. <p id="gdcalert6" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image6.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert7">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image6.png "image_tooltip") 3. Armature Bones for Blue Outfit - (Wave Queen) 4. <p id="gdcalert7" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image7.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert8">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image7.png "image_tooltip") 5. Armature Bones for White Outfit - Daisy Dress 6. <p id="gdcalert8" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image8.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert9">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image8.png "image_tooltip") 5. Orin the Red ( Used in Lesson 3 ) 5. Overview 6. Kobold ( Used in Lesson 2 ) 6. Overview 4. _What about Nyl’s BG3 Model ? _(Intermediate) 7. Nyl’s BG3 Model will be used in Lesson 4 where we will combine all the lessons learned from this tutorial. ## <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 4. Blender UI Overview used in this tutorial</span> 1. ViewPort Mode. ( 1. TimeLine 2. Text 3. 2. The Shader Editor The Shader Editor is used to edit materials which are used for rendering. Materials used by Cycles and Eevee are defined using a node tree. Therefore, the main window of the Shader editor is a node editor. <p id="gdcalert9" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image9.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert10">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image9.png "image_tooltip") The Options panel in the Sidebar region contains the same settings that are also available in the Material tab in the Properties. They differ depending on the selected render engine. The settings are duplicated to make it possible to edit the entire material from the Shader editor. 3. 4. Creating a Pose 4. Pose Library 5. Camera Settings 1. 2. Creating an Animation 6. Camera Settings 3. Parenting Camera to Empty - Camera Dolly 5. Adding Scene Lighting 7. HDRI HDRIs are a 360 image with light data recorded in them, it will affect the entire blender environment for that scene. Think of it as “world lighting” which is how blender describes it 8. Emission Shader The emission shader is within the materials properties tab and this controls the amount of “glow” a particular material has. This is useful in making armor or small details glow, depending on the emission color it will glow that color, the stronger the emission value is the more glowy it will be and area it will cover. 6. Compositor Tab This is more like the Post Processing “Lightroom” once everything is done, you can add cinematic lighting nodes, color grading , etc but without modifying the objects themselves just on what the camera will see in the final render, for example, making a scene monochromatic will make everything black and white. ## <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 5. Exporting</span> {#chapter-5-exporting} 1. Eevee 2. Cycles 3. Images 1. PNG 2. Videos 3. Filename Workflow 4. Post-Processing ## The Kobold Tutorial 1. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Lesson 2 - The Kobold Tutorial</span> 1. Chapter 1. Creating your first Render Scene 1. Render settings 2. Viewport 3. Review Addons 4. Camera Setup 2. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 2. Importing / Appending</span> 5. BlenderKit - 6. Open3DLab - 7. Polygon - HDRI 8. Sketchfab - 3. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 3. Setting up your scene</span> 9. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 4. Pose Mode</span> 10. Armatures with Control Rigs 1. IK & FK Controls 11. Armatures without Control Rigs 2. Manually posing without FK / IK Controls 3. 4. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 5. Rig Basics</span> ## Animation 1. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Lesson 3 - Animation</span> 1. Chapter 1. Animation Panels Overview The work flow I use consists of reference video, blocking out stages, in-betweens, cleaning up, camera tracking. 12 FPS in blender / export at 24 FPS I set the timeline into frames not timecode Create a block animation action, then send it to action editor Block out your poses, then saved them to the Pose Library When cleaning up, check for interpolation and key-smoothing. (think squash and stretch) Scene Lighting - i start with the standard 3-point lighting then pivot from there. Camera tracking - i place one camera on the Y axis and one on the X axis and 3rd in between the two. 1. Action Editor 2. Once you have recorded an animation on the timeline, you will want to create more animations, this is where the action editor is used. 3. Each animation will be labeled as an action. And you then can combine multiple actions. For example, a running action, then add a jumping action. Then a dancing action. 4. NLA Editor + Animation Layers - ( Non-Linear Action Editor ) 5. This is where the magic happens, in the NLA Editor you then can combine multiple actions. For example, a running action, then add a jumping action. Then a dancing action. Blender can do an “OK” job with merging them but this is where “Animation Layers” addon shines. As it gives you more freedom to switch between animations in the same armature and retains the base pose animation but without going to shit. 6. For Example - You have your character walking towards another but you want to add a head movement of them looking up and down and giving a smile. With the Animation layers, you just add another layer and then edit the head movements, then add the face shape keys layer, and the addon will merge all those separate animations together seamlessly. 2. Addons 7. Using AutoRigPro 8. Overview 9. SmartRig 10. ARP Remapping 3. Mixamo Animations 4. Rokoko Live 2. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 2. Importing Animation</span> 11. Not looking forward to this, this is the most painful process. 12. **_<span style="text-decoration:underline;">Motion capture is not perfect</span>_** 13. Mixamo 14. Rokoko 5. 3. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 3. Animating Weapons and Objects</span> 6. Child of Constraints 4. [https://www.pexels.com/photo/woman-in-blue-blazer-in-the-fitting-room-8307706/](https://www.pexels.com/photo/woman-in-blue-blazer-in-the-fitting-room-8307706/) 5. 9bd6022b0a51fa9e3a04a5cad00b7b743158d6fc 20 17 2024-02-24T01:29:32Z Kuwelsco 2 wikitext text/x-wiki Hello! This requires some slight awareness of Blender. Basic Navigation - the Sidebar on the Left is the Chapter Outline, the Table of Contents below is the Sections and Lessons I set this layout this way so if you are having problems, you can easily refer to the Lesson Number and provide assistance if needed. 🚨🚨🚨Disclaimer🚨🚨🚨🚨 🚨🚨I’m not a fan of hardcore lewd stuff🚨🚨 Simple way to vibe check, is to use the _“Game of Thrones Test”_ (the TV show not the book! 😂) If anything is more spicy than what was shown on Game of Thrones then all that I ask is to please blur it out before asking for help. Lastly, NO DISSING KOBOLDS 😂or at least just not Popper The Businesslord ### _<span style="text-decoration:underline;">“So whats the goal of this Tutorial ?”</span>_ {#“so-whats-the-goal-of-this-tutorial-”} To help users to be more familiar with Blender and remove the harsh learning curve. I learned Blender from using FFXIV Game Models, So I strongly feel that by using content you are familiar with, that will also give you that extra motivation finishing your goal in learning Blender. This is also a way to further improve my own skills in Blender. To quote [Jim Kwik :](https://www.jimkwik.com/podcasts/kwik-brain-001-learning-anything-faster) * _If you want to cut your learning curve in half, learn with the intention of teaching it to somebody else._ * _If you had to give a presentation on what you’re learning today, you would learn it differently. You would pay closer attention. You would take more detailed notes. You would ask better questions._ * _When you teach something, You get to learn it twice._ ### _<span style="text-decoration:underline;">“Ok. So what will I learn in this tutorial?”</span>_ {#“ok-so-what-will-i-learn-in-this-tutorial-”} Able to use the Nyls Model and any other model from Open3DLab/Smutbase/Etc You would learn to pose your own scene render in Eevee similar to this Popper the Kobold here. <p id="gdcalert1" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image1.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert2">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image1.png "image_tooltip") Example 2 ### _<span style="text-decoration:underline;">“Sold! What Do I need to do?”</span>_ {#“sold-what-do-i-need-to-do-”} ## Chapter 1. Getting Started - Intro ### Blender 3.6 LTS {#blender-3-6-lts} **Please use Blender 3.6 LTS** Yes, there is Blender 4 out but 3.6 has the most addon compatibility at the moment. The goal of this tutorial is to simplify the learning curve of making simple animations in Blender using the BG3 characters, now yes there are a lot of shortcuts used here. Some addons will cost money or have free versions to use. Again these are the tools I currently use to make poses and animations. Yes, This is a very niche tutorial and straight to the point. You will not be using any paid add on until **Lesson 3 - Animation.** I did this to help everyone not feel pressured into buying anything until you feel more comfortable using Blender prior to making that leap into paid addons. So again please don't rush out and buy any addons. 1. **Addons** Blender has support for many awesome addons both internally that ship with blender and also install user made addons, To enable internal addons you go …. To install an external addon you go to preferences, Addons… Internal Addons - Need to Activate Please enable to following features within blender, Make Camera from View Images as Planes Addons - External 3rd Party : **AutoRigPro - (You won't use it until Lesson 3!)** This being a course for a very specific goal, the models you will use are already rigged and weighted, posed, etc. So for the first 2 lessons we will not be using AutorigPro, also to avoid information overload. The only feature being used by AutoRigPro will be the “Remapping” which is transferring the animation from one (mixamo) armatures to another in this case being your BG3 model used in this tutorial. 👏 Ahem 👏this👏is 👏a 👏huge👏time👏saver!👏 Cost :** $40 (Full) Auto-Rig Pro + Smart + Remap + Fbx Export** Link : [https://blendermarket.com/products/auto-rig-pro](https://blendermarket.com/products/auto-rig-pro) Free Version - NO **Animation Layers**. **(You won't use it until Lesson 3!)** This is to simplify the NLA Editing animation and to make it more user friendly and forgiving when combining multiple animations, plus it has a lot of features that really make the NLA editor less intimidating. 👏 Ahem 👏this👏is 👏a 👏huge👏time👏saver!👏 _Link - Price_ _Free Version - Yes_ **Polygon ( Used in Lesson 2 )** This addon is just an asset library from the Polygon site, we will be using it to import HDRIs to adjust the lighting and again make it easier for the sole purpose of our renders. **Free**! ( Optional! ) **Photographer 5 - ** ## <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 2. Basic UI Setup Workflow</span> [[Blender Layout]] 5. Shader / Material Properties 7. Overview 7. Nodes 8. Textures 9. UV Maps 10. 6. 5. ## <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 3. Models & Rig used in this Tutorial </span> 1. BG3 Rigs / Models used in this tutorial Shadowheart by bobot from smutbase ( Used in Lesson 3 and 4) Link : [https://smutba.se/project/37102/](https://smutba.se/project/37102/) Orin the Red by bobot from smutbase ( Not used in Tutorial, but Explained) Link : [https://smutba.se/project/38182/](https://smutba.se/project/38182/) Kobold by SamagthraV2 from Open3DLab (Lesson 2) Link : [https://open3dlab.com/project/36936/](https://open3dlab.com/project/36936/) 2. Model Overview (Armatures, Rigs, etc) 1. We will go over the basics of each of the models in this tutorial and along the way provide terms and definitions of each of the components used within Blender. 2. An “**Armature**” is a type of object used for rigging, basically a skeleton. Armatures borrow the same structure (bones) from real-world skeletons. 3. A rig is the controls and strings that move a marionette (puppet). The Main takeaway is that Armature are more difficult to pose as compared to a fully controlled rigged character. The reason for this is because it lacks any IK / FK controls. So if you move the Hand, the rest of the arm and shoulder will not move. You will have to pose from the base bone in the chain. ( explain more later on) 1. This is an Armature : 1. <p id="gdcalert4" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image4.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert5">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image4.png "image_tooltip") This is a Rig: 2. <p id="gdcalert5" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image5.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert6">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image5.png "image_tooltip") 4. The Shadowheart body rig is a standard human rig equipped with "Rig Controllers." The main armature is entirely hidden, allowing for model posing exclusively through the rig controllers. [[IK & FK Controls]] Rigged Characters will feature a lot of additional features such as IK & FK Kinematics to allow you to make movements akin to real world movements. IK stands for Inverse Kinematics, and FK stands for Forward Kinematics. Both are rig systems used to control characters or objects in animation, making the process more manageable and offering better control. **Differences and Uses**: FK operates on a chain system where moving a "parent" bone affects all connected "child" bones, ideal for sequential movement like swinging arms. IK, conversely, allows for moving a "child" bone to adjust the position of all parent bones up the chain, useful for precise end-point movements like positioning a hand. **When to Use Each System:** Typically, IK is used for parts that need to be positioned precisely, like feet that must stay planted on the ground, while FK is preferred for upper body movements unless interacting with objects. **Switching Between IK and FK:** Animators often switch between IK and FK to achieve the desired animation effect, such as during interactions with objects or dynamic movements, with rigs usually featuring built-in controllers for this purpose. _If you ever need a quick refresher, _ _The following video explains briefly the differences between IK & FK Kinematics._ [https://youtu.be/nGd7NlrT310?si=tR7PeaHe83GT71dR](https://youtu.be/nGd7NlrT310?si=tR7PeaHe83GT71dR) This is how IK in Pose Mode Blender looks like. [https://youtu.be/cZXPObAzGxE](https://youtu.be/cZXPObAzGxE) @https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cZXPObAzGxE When I grab the IK Hand control, the shoulder and the elbow follow the movements of the IK Hand control as IK controls are at the end of the bone chain. 2. Clothing Armatures 3. To Access the Armature for the following clothing, select the main rig 4. <p id="gdcalert6" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image6.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert7">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image6.png "image_tooltip") 3. Armature Bones for Blue Outfit - (Wave Queen) 4. <p id="gdcalert7" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image7.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert8">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image7.png "image_tooltip") 5. Armature Bones for White Outfit - Daisy Dress 6. <p id="gdcalert8" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image8.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert9">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image8.png "image_tooltip") 5. Orin the Red ( Used in Lesson 3 ) 5. Overview 6. Kobold ( Used in Lesson 2 ) 6. Overview 4. _What about Nyl’s BG3 Model ? _(Intermediate) 7. Nyl’s BG3 Model will be used in Lesson 4 where we will combine all the lessons learned from this tutorial. ## <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 4. Blender UI Overview used in this tutorial</span> 1. ViewPort Mode. ( 1. TimeLine 2. Text 3. 2. The Shader Editor The Shader Editor is used to edit materials which are used for rendering. Materials used by Cycles and Eevee are defined using a node tree. Therefore, the main window of the Shader editor is a node editor. <p id="gdcalert9" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image9.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert10">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image9.png "image_tooltip") The Options panel in the Sidebar region contains the same settings that are also available in the Material tab in the Properties. They differ depending on the selected render engine. The settings are duplicated to make it possible to edit the entire material from the Shader editor. 3. 4. Creating a Pose 4. Pose Library 5. Camera Settings 1. 2. Creating an Animation 6. Camera Settings 3. Parenting Camera to Empty - Camera Dolly 5. Adding Scene Lighting 7. HDRI HDRIs are a 360 image with light data recorded in them, it will affect the entire blender environment for that scene. Think of it as “world lighting” which is how blender describes it 8. Emission Shader The emission shader is within the materials properties tab and this controls the amount of “glow” a particular material has. This is useful in making armor or small details glow, depending on the emission color it will glow that color, the stronger the emission value is the more glowy it will be and area it will cover. 6. Compositor Tab This is more like the Post Processing “Lightroom” once everything is done, you can add cinematic lighting nodes, color grading , etc but without modifying the objects themselves just on what the camera will see in the final render, for example, making a scene monochromatic will make everything black and white. ## <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 5. Exporting</span> {#chapter-5-exporting} 1. Eevee 2. Cycles 3. Images 1. PNG 2. Videos 3. Filename Workflow 4. Post-Processing ## The Kobold Tutorial 1. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Lesson 2 - The Kobold Tutorial</span> 1. Chapter 1. Creating your first Render Scene 1. Render settings 2. Viewport 3. Review Addons 4. Camera Setup 2. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 2. Importing / Appending</span> 5. BlenderKit - 6. Open3DLab - 7. Polygon - HDRI 8. Sketchfab - 3. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 3. Setting up your scene</span> 9. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 4. Pose Mode</span> 10. Armatures with Control Rigs 1. IK & FK Controls 11. Armatures without Control Rigs 2. Manually posing without FK / IK Controls 3. 4. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 5. Rig Basics</span> ## Animation 1. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Lesson 3 - Animation</span> 1. Chapter 1. Animation Panels Overview The work flow I use consists of reference video, blocking out stages, in-betweens, cleaning up, camera tracking. 12 FPS in blender / export at 24 FPS I set the timeline into frames not timecode Create a block animation action, then send it to action editor Block out your poses, then saved them to the Pose Library When cleaning up, check for interpolation and key-smoothing. (think squash and stretch) Scene Lighting - i start with the standard 3-point lighting then pivot from there. Camera tracking - i place one camera on the Y axis and one on the X axis and 3rd in between the two. 1. Action Editor 2. Once you have recorded an animation on the timeline, you will want to create more animations, this is where the action editor is used. 3. Each animation will be labeled as an action. And you then can combine multiple actions. For example, a running action, then add a jumping action. Then a dancing action. 4. NLA Editor + Animation Layers - ( Non-Linear Action Editor ) 5. This is where the magic happens, in the NLA Editor you then can combine multiple actions. For example, a running action, then add a jumping action. Then a dancing action. Blender can do an “OK” job with merging them but this is where “Animation Layers” addon shines. As it gives you more freedom to switch between animations in the same armature and retains the base pose animation but without going to shit. 6. For Example - You have your character walking towards another but you want to add a head movement of them looking up and down and giving a smile. With the Animation layers, you just add another layer and then edit the head movements, then add the face shape keys layer, and the addon will merge all those separate animations together seamlessly. 2. Addons 7. Using AutoRigPro 8. Overview 9. SmartRig 10. ARP Remapping 3. Mixamo Animations 4. Rokoko Live 2. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 2. Importing Animation</span> 11. Not looking forward to this, this is the most painful process. 12. **_<span style="text-decoration:underline;">Motion capture is not perfect</span>_** 13. Mixamo 14. Rokoko 5. 3. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 3. Animating Weapons and Objects</span> 6. Child of Constraints 4. [https://www.pexels.com/photo/woman-in-blue-blazer-in-the-fitting-room-8307706/](https://www.pexels.com/photo/woman-in-blue-blazer-in-the-fitting-room-8307706/) 5. 01078ba0ba1568197fd91f4815bc729511d52904 23 20 2024-02-24T01:34:33Z Kuwelsco 2 wikitext text/x-wiki Hello! This requires some slight awareness of Blender. Basic Navigation - the Sidebar on the Left is the Chapter Outline, the Table of Contents below is the Sections and Lessons I set this layout this way so if you are having problems, you can easily refer to the Lesson Number and provide assistance if needed. 🚨🚨🚨Disclaimer🚨🚨🚨🚨 🚨🚨I’m not a fan of hardcore lewd stuff🚨🚨 Simple way to vibe check, is to use the _“Game of Thrones Test”_ (the TV show not the book! 😂) If anything is more spicy than what was shown on Game of Thrones then all that I ask is to please blur it out before asking for help. Lastly, NO DISSING KOBOLDS 😂or at least just not Popper The Businesslord '''<br /><span style="text-decoration:underline;">“So whats the goal of this Tutorial ?”</span>''' To help users to be more familiar with Blender and remove the harsh learning curve. I learned Blender from using FFXIV Game Models, So I strongly feel that by using content you are familiar with, that will also give you that extra motivation finishing your goal in learning Blender. This is also a way to further improve my own skills in Blender. To quote [Jim Kwik :](https://www.jimkwik.com/podcasts/kwik-brain-001-learning-anything-faster) * ''if you want to cut your learning curve in half, learn with the intention of teaching it to somebody else.'' * ''If you had to give a presentation on what you’re learning today, you would learn it differently. You would pay closer attention. You would take more detailed notes. You would ask better questions.'' * ''When you teach something, You get to learn it twice.'' # <span style="text-decoration:underline;">“Ok. So what will I learn in this tutorial?”</span> Able to use the Nyls Model and any other model from Open3DLab/Smutbase/Etc You would learn to pose your own scene render in Eevee similar to this Popper the Kobold here. _<span style="text-decoration:underline;">“Sold! What Do I need to do?”</span>_ {#“sold-what-do-i-need-to-do-”} ## Chapter 1. Getting Started - Intro Please use Blender 3.6 LTS** Yes, there is Blender 4 out but 3.6 has the most addon compatibility at the moment. The goal of this tutorial is to simplify the learning curve of making simple animations in Blender using the BG3 characters, now yes there are a lot of shortcuts used here. Some addons will cost money or have free versions to use. Again these are the tools I currently use to make poses and animations. Yes, This is a very niche tutorial and straight to the point. You will not be using any paid add on until **Lesson 3 - Animation.** I did this to help everyone not feel pressured into buying anything until you feel more comfortable using Blender prior to making that leap into paid addons. So again please don't rush out and buy any addons. 1. **Addons** Blender has support for many awesome addons both internally that ship with blender and also install user made addons, To enable internal addons you go …. To install an external addon you go to preferences, Addons… Internal Addons - Need to Activate Please enable to following features within blender, Make Camera from View Images as Planes Addons - External 3rd Party : **AutoRigPro - (You won't use it until Lesson 3!)** This being a course for a very specific goal, the models you will use are already rigged and weighted, posed, etc. So for the first 2 lessons we will not be using AutorigPro, also to avoid information overload. The only feature being used by AutoRigPro will be the “Remapping” which is transferring the animation from one (mixamo) armatures to another in this case being your BG3 model used in this tutorial. 👏 Ahem 👏this👏is 👏a 👏huge👏time👏saver!👏 Cost :** $40 (Full) Auto-Rig Pro + Smart + Remap + Fbx Export** Link : [https://blendermarket.com/products/auto-rig-pro](https://blendermarket.com/products/auto-rig-pro) Free Version - NO **Animation Layers**. **(You won't use it until Lesson 3!)** This is to simplify the NLA Editing animation and to make it more user friendly and forgiving when combining multiple animations, plus it has a lot of features that really make the NLA editor less intimidating. 👏 Ahem 👏this👏is 👏a 👏huge👏time👏saver!👏 _Link - Price_ _Free Version - Yes_ **Polygon ( Used in Lesson 2 )** This addon is just an asset library from the Polygon site, we will be using it to import HDRIs to adjust the lighting and again make it easier for the sole purpose of our renders. **Free**! ( Optional! ) **Photographer 5 - ** ## <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 2. Basic UI Setup Workflow</span> [[Blender Layout]] 5. Shader / Material Properties 7. Overview 7. Nodes 8. Textures 9. UV Maps 10. 6. 5. ## <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 3. Models & Rig used in this Tutorial </span> 1. BG3 Rigs / Models used in this tutorial [[Shadowheart by bobot|Shadowheart by bobot from smutbase ( Used in Lesson 3 and 4)]] Kobold by SamagthraV2 from Open3DLab (Lesson 2) Link : [https://open3dlab.com/project/36936/](https://open3dlab.com/project/36936/) 2. Model Overview (Armatures, Rigs, etc) 1. We will go over the basics of each of the models in this tutorial and along the way provide terms and definitions of each of the components used within Blender. 2. An “**Armature**” is a type of object used for rigging, basically a skeleton. Armatures borrow the same structure (bones) from real-world skeletons. 3. A rig is the controls and strings that move a marionette (puppet). The Main takeaway is that Armature are more difficult to pose as compared to a fully controlled rigged character. The reason for this is because it lacks any IK / FK controls. So if you move the Hand, the rest of the arm and shoulder will not move. You will have to pose from the base bone in the chain. ( explain more later on) 1. This is an Armature : 1. <p id="gdcalert4" ></p> This is a Rig: <p id="gdcalert5" ></p> [[IK & FK Controls]] 2. Clothing Armatures 3. To Access the Armature for the following clothing, select the main rig 4. <p id="gdcalert6" ></p> 3. Armature Bones for Blue Outfit - (Wave Queen) 4. <p id="gdcalert7" ></p> 5. Armature Bones for White Outfit - Daisy Dress 6. <p id="gdcalert8" ></p> 5. Orin the Red ( Used in Lesson 3 ) 5. Overview 6. Kobold ( Used in Lesson 2 ) 6. Overview 4. _What about Nyl’s BG3 Model ? _(Intermediate) 7. Nyl’s BG3 Model will be used in Lesson 4 where we will combine all the lessons learned from this tutorial. ## <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 4. Blender UI Overview used in this tutorial</span> 1. ViewPort Mode. ( 1. TimeLine 2. Text 3. 2. The Shader Editor The Shader Editor is used to edit materials which are used for rendering. Materials used by Cycles and Eevee are defined using a node tree. Therefore, the main window of the Shader editor is a node editor. The Options panel in the Sidebar region contains the same settings that are also available in the Material tab in the Properties. They differ depending on the selected render engine. The settings are duplicated to make it possible to edit the entire material from the Shader editor. 3. 4. Creating a Pose 4. Pose Library 5. Camera Settings 1. 2. Creating an Animation 6. Camera Settings 3. Parenting Camera to Empty - Camera Dolly 5. Adding Scene Lighting 7. HDRI HDRIs are a 360 image with light data recorded in them, it will affect the entire blender environment for that scene. Think of it as “world lighting” which is how blender describes it 8. Emission Shader The emission shader is within the materials properties tab and this controls the amount of “glow” a particular material has. This is useful in making armor or small details glow, depending on the emission color it will glow that color, the stronger the emission value is the more glowy it will be and area it will cover. 6. Compositor Tab This is more like the Post Processing “Lightroom” once everything is done, you can add cinematic lighting nodes, color grading , etc but without modifying the objects themselves just on what the camera will see in the final render, for example, making a scene monochromatic will make everything black and white. ## <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 5. Exporting</span> {#chapter-5-exporting} 1. Eevee 2. Cycles 3. Images 1. PNG 2. Videos 3. Filename Workflow 4. Post-Processing ## The Kobold Tutorial 1. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Lesson 2 - The Kobold Tutorial</span> 1. Chapter 1. Creating your first Render Scene 1. Render settings 2. Viewport 3. Review Addons 4. Camera Setup 2. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 2. Importing / Appending</span> 5. BlenderKit - 6. Open3DLab - 7. Polygon - HDRI 8. Sketchfab - 3. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 3. Setting up your scene</span> 9. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 4. Pose Mode</span> 10. Armatures with Control Rigs 1. IK & FK Controls 11. Armatures without Control Rigs 2. Manually posing without FK / IK Controls 3. 4. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 5. Rig Basics</span> ## Animation 1. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Lesson 3 - Animation</span> 1. Chapter 1. Animation Panels Overview The work flow I use consists of reference video, blocking out stages, in-betweens, cleaning up, camera tracking. 12 FPS in blender / export at 24 FPS I set the timeline into frames not timecode Create a block animation action, then send it to action editor Block out your poses, then saved them to the Pose Library When cleaning up, check for interpolation and key-smoothing. (think squash and stretch) Scene Lighting - i start with the standard 3-point lighting then pivot from there. Camera tracking - i place one camera on the Y axis and one on the X axis and 3rd in between the two. 1. Action Editor 2. Once you have recorded an animation on the timeline, you will want to create more animations, this is where the action editor is used. 3. Each animation will be labeled as an action. And you then can combine multiple actions. For example, a running action, then add a jumping action. Then a dancing action. 4. NLA Editor + Animation Layers - ( Non-Linear Action Editor ) 5. This is where the magic happens, in the NLA Editor you then can combine multiple actions. For example, a running action, then add a jumping action. Then a dancing action. Blender can do an “OK” job with merging them but this is where “Animation Layers” addon shines. As it gives you more freedom to switch between animations in the same armature and retains the base pose animation but without going to shit. 6. For Example - You have your character walking towards another but you want to add a head movement of them looking up and down and giving a smile. With the Animation layers, you just add another layer and then edit the head movements, then add the face shape keys layer, and the addon will merge all those separate animations together seamlessly. 2. Addons 7. Using AutoRigPro 8. Overview 9. SmartRig 10. ARP Remapping 3. Mixamo Animations 4. Rokoko Live 2. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 2. Importing Animation</span> 11. Not looking forward to this, this is the most painful process. 12. **_<span style="text-decoration:underline;">Motion capture is not perfect</span>_** 13. Mixamo 14. Rokoko 5. 3. <span style="text-decoration:underline;">Chapter 3. Animating Weapons and Objects</span> 6. Child of Constraints 4. [https://www.pexels.com/photo/woman-in-blue-blazer-in-the-fitting-room-8307706/](https://www.pexels.com/photo/woman-in-blue-blazer-in-the-fitting-room-8307706/) 5. dcd05c059ad1a54ea6895dce55b13fdcac895b50 Blender Layout 0 5 15 2024-02-24T00:53:31Z Kuwelsco 2 Created page with "== Heading text == Setting up Blender Layout and UI Quick Favorites Menu - “Q” button <p id="gdcalert2" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image2.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert3">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/..." wikitext text/x-wiki == Heading text == Setting up Blender Layout and UI Quick Favorites Menu - “Q” button <p id="gdcalert2" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image2.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert3">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image2.png "image_tooltip") The Q button will be your best friend, you will map a lot of repeatable actions to the Q key, you can add actions by selecting over and right clicking “Add to Quick Favorites”. Your Quick Favorites are mode specific, so each mode will have a list of quick favorites, you will just need to re-add your quick actions within each mode. **Please Bind the Following Commands to your Quick Favorites :** 1. Walk Navigation #### This will enable you to use your “WASD” keys to move around the blender viewport space. You need to set up for each mode, (Object Mode, Edit Mode and Pose Mode). 2. Render Settings 2. Eevee 1. More faster less detail - Turn on bloom, motion blur, simply normals 3. Cycles 2. More GPU intensive longer rendering times - Ray Tracing Engine 4. View Porting Settings 3. For Eevee set to textured mode 4. For Cycle set the Viewport render down to 16 to 32 2. The Viewport 3. Object Mode - Tab 5. This is your default viewport, it mostly looks at the mesh and environment, it looks all nice and pretty. Which is awful for animating, because majority of your time will be in Pose Mode, 6. Yes the model will look ugly and the colors doodoo flat but you don't need your GPU stalling out when you are trying to pose and it's still busy trying to render the screen. 3. Edit Mode - Tab 4. Edit mode is to modify the mesh when you click on the mesh then switch to Edit Mode Note! If you click on the Armature then switch to Edit mode, you will be EDITING THE ARMATURE BONES! <span style="text-decoration:underline;">For this crash course, you will not be messing with the Edit Object Mode or the Armature Edit mode.</span> 4. Pose Mode - Ctrl + Tab 5. Armature Overview*When going into Pose Mode, to save your CPU and GPU some processing power, you must First Change the Viewport mode to Viewport Shading then click the small “V” and select Lighting leave as Studio and for Color change it to “Texture” <p id="gdcalert3" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image3.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert4">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image3.png "image_tooltip") Figure Lesson 1 - 2.1 6. 47e21289a16a1742d4d93839a21f2d3baff740c1 16 15 2024-02-24T00:53:55Z Kuwelsco 2 wikitext text/x-wiki == Heading text == Setting up Blender Layout and UI == Heading text == Quick Favorites Menu - “Q” button <p id="gdcalert2" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image2.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert3">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image2.png "image_tooltip") The Q button will be your best friend, you will map a lot of repeatable actions to the Q key, you can add actions by selecting over and right clicking “Add to Quick Favorites”. Your Quick Favorites are mode specific, so each mode will have a list of quick favorites, you will just need to re-add your quick actions within each mode. **Please Bind the Following Commands to your Quick Favorites :** 1. Walk Navigation #### This will enable you to use your “WASD” keys to move around the blender viewport space. You need to set up for each mode, (Object Mode, Edit Mode and Pose Mode). 2. Render Settings 2. Eevee 1. More faster less detail - Turn on bloom, motion blur, simply normals 3. Cycles 2. More GPU intensive longer rendering times - Ray Tracing Engine 4. View Porting Settings 3. For Eevee set to textured mode 4. For Cycle set the Viewport render down to 16 to 32 2. The Viewport 3. Object Mode - Tab 5. This is your default viewport, it mostly looks at the mesh and environment, it looks all nice and pretty. Which is awful for animating, because majority of your time will be in Pose Mode, 6. Yes the model will look ugly and the colors doodoo flat but you don't need your GPU stalling out when you are trying to pose and it's still busy trying to render the screen. 3. Edit Mode - Tab 4. Edit mode is to modify the mesh when you click on the mesh then switch to Edit Mode Note! If you click on the Armature then switch to Edit mode, you will be EDITING THE ARMATURE BONES! <span style="text-decoration:underline;">For this crash course, you will not be messing with the Edit Object Mode or the Armature Edit mode.</span> 4. Pose Mode - Ctrl + Tab 5. Armature Overview*When going into Pose Mode, to save your CPU and GPU some processing power, you must First Change the Viewport mode to Viewport Shading then click the small “V” and select Lighting leave as Studio and for Color change it to “Texture” <p id="gdcalert3" ><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> gd2md-html alert: inline image link here (to images/image3.png). Store image on your image server and adjust path/filename/extension if necessary. </span><br>(<a href="#">Back to top</a>)(<a href="#gdcalert4">Next alert</a>)<br><span style="color: red; font-weight: bold">>>>>> </span></p> ![alt_text](images/image3.png "image_tooltip") Figure Lesson 1 - 2.1 6. 3cff25e8cdc6a18070ce0634522a2a400ad42e05 Shadowheart by bobot 0 6 18 2024-02-24T01:25:28Z Kuwelsco 2 Created page with "The Shadowheart body rig is a standard human rig equipped with "Rig Controllers." The main armature is entirely hidden, allowing for model posing exclusively through the rig controllers." wikitext text/x-wiki The Shadowheart body rig is a standard human rig equipped with "Rig Controllers." The main armature is entirely hidden, allowing for model posing exclusively through the rig controllers. ed47bd150a6c93f09a49534f1d0d22a9919b5c7e IK & FK Controls 0 7 19 2024-02-24T01:27:44Z Kuwelsco 2 Created page with "Rigged Characters will feature a lot of additional features such as IK & FK Kinematics to allow you to make movements akin to real world movements. IK stands for Inverse Kinematics, and FK stands for Forward Kinematics. Both are rig systems used to control characters or objects in animation, making the process more manageable and offering better control. Differences and Uses**: FK operates on a chain system where moving a "parent" bone affects all connected "child" bo..." wikitext text/x-wiki Rigged Characters will feature a lot of additional features such as IK & FK Kinematics to allow you to make movements akin to real world movements. IK stands for Inverse Kinematics, and FK stands for Forward Kinematics. Both are rig systems used to control characters or objects in animation, making the process more manageable and offering better control. Differences and Uses**: FK operates on a chain system where moving a "parent" bone affects all connected "child" bones, ideal for sequential movement like swinging arms. IK, conversely, allows for moving a "child" bone to adjust the position of all parent bones up the chain, useful for precise end-point movements like positioning a hand. When to Use Each System:** Typically, IK is used for parts that need to be positioned precisely, like feet that must stay planted on the ground, while FK is preferred for upper body movements unless interacting with objects. Switching Between IK and FK:** Animators often switch between IK and FK to achieve the desired animation effect, such as during interactions with objects or dynamic movements, with rigs usually featuring built-in controllers for this purpose. If you ever need a quick refresher,    The following video explains briefly the differences between IK & FK Kinematics. <nowiki>https://youtu.be/nGd7NlrT310?si=tR7PeaHe83GT71dR</nowiki>    This is how IK in Pose Mode Blender looks like.    [2](<nowiki>https://youtu.be/cZXPObAzGxE</nowiki>) @<nowiki>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cZXPObAzGxE</nowiki>    When I grab the IK Hand control, the shoulder and the elbow follow the movements of the IK Hand control as IK controls are at the end of the bone chain. 1204b38d5d3112503d2ed57a91abf23f5c610861 21 19 2024-02-24T01:31:16Z Kuwelsco 2 wikitext text/x-wiki Rigged Characters will feature a lot of additional features such as IK & FK Kinematics to allow you to make movements akin to real world movements. IK stands for Inverse Kinematics, and FK stands for Forward Kinematics. Both are rig systems used to control characters or objects in animation, making the process more manageable and offering better control. Differences and Uses**: FK operates on a chain system where moving a "parent" bone affects all connected "child" bones, ideal for sequential movement like swinging arms. IK, conversely, allows for moving a "child" bone to adjust the position of all parent bones up the chain, useful for precise end-point movements like positioning a hand. When to Use Each System:** Typically, IK is used for parts that need to be positioned precisely, like feet that must stay planted on the ground, while FK is preferred for upper body movements unless interacting with objects. Switching Between IK and FK:** Animators often switch between IK and FK to achieve the desired animation effect, such as during interactions with objects or dynamic movements, with rigs usually featuring built-in controllers for this purpose. If you ever need a quick refresher,    The following video explains briefly the differences between IK & FK Kinematics.    This is how IK in Pose Mode Blender looks like. <youtube>cZXPObAzGxE</youtube> @<nowiki>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cZXPObAzGxE</nowiki>    When I grab the IK Hand control, the shoulder and the elbow follow the movements of the IK Hand control as IK controls are at the end of the bone chain. 3b93c8c17375af603d172fd11ac9790bd219749d 22 21 2024-02-24T01:33:21Z Kuwelsco 2 wikitext text/x-wiki Rigged Characters will feature a lot of additional features such as IK & FK Kinematics to allow you to make movements akin to real world movements. IK stands for Inverse Kinematics, and FK stands for Forward Kinematics. Both are rig systems used to control characters or objects in animation, making the process more manageable and offering better control. Differences and Uses**: FK operates on a chain system where moving a "parent" bone affects all connected "child" bones, ideal for sequential movement like swinging arms. IK, conversely, allows for moving a "child" bone to adjust the position of all parent bones up the chain, useful for precise end-point movements like positioning a hand. When to Use Each System:** Typically, IK is used for parts that need to be positioned precisely, like feet that must stay planted on the ground, while FK is preferred for upper body movements unless interacting with objects. Switching Between IK and FK:** Animators often switch between IK and FK to achieve the desired animation effect, such as during interactions with objects or dynamic movements, with rigs usually featuring built-in controllers for this purpose. If you ever need a quick refresher,    The following video explains briefly the differences between IK & FK Kinematics. <youtube>nGd7NlrT310</youtube>    This is how IK in Pose Mode Blender looks like. <youtube>cZXPObAzGxE</youtube>    When I grab the IK Hand control, the shoulder and the elbow follow the movements of the IK Hand control as IK controls are at the end of the bone chain. d9a429da8d37affd1e40ae57bd4c93685efbac59